


Making History

by electroniccollectiondonut



Series: Making History Verse [1]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Accidental Marriage, Accidental Spousal Murder, Adopted Children, Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Childhood Trauma, Communication Failure, Darkening of Valinor, Elenéþa Is A Good Wife, Emotional Manipulation, Everyone Is Alive, Extended Families, F/M, Family, Finrod is Trying His Best, First Age, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Forced Marriage, Fëanor Is In Love, Gen, Good Parent Fëanor, Hypnosis, Implied Sexual Content, Insanity, Lack of Communication, Literal Sleeping Together, Magic, Maglor Gets a Hug, Maglor Needs A Hug, Major Character Injury, Murder, My First Work in This Fandom, Negotiations, Nightmares, Not Really Character Death, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Panic Attacks, Past Character Death, Past Relationship(s), Platonic Romance, Poor Maglor, Prophetic Visions, Psychological Trauma, Quenya, Quenya Names, Rating May Change, Scars, Secrets, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred, Semi-Platonic Marriage, Silmarils, Some Romance, Sparring, Tags May Change, Temporary Character Death, The Valar are Eldritch Abominations, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Trauma, Warnings May Change, emotional breakdown, this is on hiatus until i finish my finals
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-01
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2019-12-30 07:04:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 31
Words: 54,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18310601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electroniccollectiondonut/pseuds/electroniccollectiondonut
Summary: The greatest of the living Eldar is dying. In attempting to remedy this, the Lords and Ladies of the Valar end up with rather more of a mess than they're prepared to deal with. The subjects of this tremendous disaster don't have the luxury of time to sort things out, so they take matters into their own hands. Fortunately, they're both rather good at throwing Eru's plans back in his face when it suits them.Author is doing NaNo. There will be no November updates.





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the Valar make a mistake.

Kanafinwё Makalaurё was dying. Most of the Valar found this absolutely unacceptable. In fact, all but Ulmo were resolved not to let death befall him.

* * *

He slept brokenly in the Healing Halls at Imladris, the city's lord tending him with pursed lips and buried panic. Fever had near claimed him ere dawn that morning, but by some miracle, he still drew breath. Elrond Peredhil sent up a prayer to all the Valar and settled in for another fearful night at his foster father's bedside.

* * *

He'd scarcely finished any work that day, too preoccupied with worry for the ancient elf barely clinging to life in a bed three floors down. Finally, Erestor and Glorfindel had walked in, taken the stack of paperwork from his desk, and shoved him toward the door.

* * *

Now he sat in a hard chair for the third night in a row, a too-familiar worry nagging at him. The same worry he'd felt before the Battle of Dagorlad and—and before Sirion, Eregion, Numenor, so many others… He took a shaky breath and resigned himself to the fact that his Adar wasn't going to last the night. And if Námo wished to claim Maglor Fёanorion, Elrond would be at his side until the last, and pick up the pieces after.

* * *

A furious gesture stirred storms on the sea far below. "We are not meant to do this!" Ulmo cried.

His protests went unacknowledged save by Vairё.

"We  _are_  doing this, with or without your help," she said, her thousand eyes unblinking. The aqueous Vala was shocked that even the usually placid Vairё was so determined to go against Eru's plan. He knew she was trying to convince him to join in with their treason, but he would not. The last time a Vala went against Eru… No. Ulmo would not help them. Not even if he could hear the Peredhil's desperate, panicked prayer… Guilt started to creep in, but he turned away from where the other Valar were working their magic.

It was Nienna's shout that told him something had gone wrong. Ulmo whirled to face her and the others, no longer worried about what Eru would think. He stepped in without thinking, following Varda's lead. He didn't know exactly what they'd been doing at first, but now it seemed like a half-desperate attempt to keep the subjects of their spell—because there were apparently two of them now—from dying horribly.

When the urgency had passed, they all gathered to see what they had wrought, and they stood aghast when they saw something that should not be.

Ulmo glared at the others, not quiteknowing what to say but needing to say something. Finally, he decided on a rebuke. "I knew you shouldn't have tried anything so drastic.  _I told you not to do this!_  And you did it anyway, and it went wrong, and now look what's happened." He gestured sharply with each sentence, stirring up his ocean further until the skies had gone dark.

Something should be done. Something  _must_  be done. But this mistake couldn't be fixed by anyone save Eru himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't actually mean to write that part in Ulmo's POV, it just sort of happened.


	2. Chapter One

Maglor’s visit to Imladris a fortnight before Elrond’s departure to the West was not entirely unexpected. What was surprising was the fact that the Noldo stumbled through the gates half-conscious and covered in blood _just two weeks before_ _Elrond was due to sail._ The inhabitants of Imladris were already moving at a fever pitch preparing for a new lord; Maglor’s dramatic arrival could only serve to cause more confusion.

He knew this. However, he also knew that Imladris was the only city that would take his arrival in stride even during a time of such stress. That, and he was fairly certain he would end up dead in the wilderness somewhere if he tried to go much further.

When Maglor had chosen to go to Imladris, he had expected it to solve his problems. His current one, at the very least. He hadn’t expected it to become the source of a hundred more. He should have known better, he thought bitterly. When did anything ever go right for the Sons of Fёanor?

* * *

The last thing he remembered was being drastically outnumbered by orcs and his subsequent flight to Imladris. Now he was kneeling in the leaves in a forest he hadn’t visited in six thousand years, a teary-eyed, slightly bloodied Elfling cradled to his chest.

* * *

_Maglor had come to slowly and painfully. And, much to his own anxiety, definitely not in Imladris. He was dressed in a thin nightshirt, not nearly enough for someone wandering the forest in the dimming twilight. The first thing he noticed, and arguably the least important given the situation, was that he could hear a whip-poor-will starting to sing somewhere above him. The most important, which took him a few moments, was that there was an Elfling curled up at his feet, asleep in a pile of lavish silks and velvets. Said Elfling was far too familiar for comfort, but Maglor couldn’t read too far into that at the moment or he might panic._

_He shook the Elfling awake, careful of the blood drying on the tiny arm. He wasn’t sure where the child was wounded or how badly, but he was shivering on the ground, and Maglor was suddenly reminded of the first time he had seen this Elfling, clinging to his twin brother in terrified silence during the aftermath of the kinslaying at Sirion._

* * *

He gathered the waking child to his chest, bouncing and rocking him as best he could while still sitting. His breath was measured, his voice soft and even as he tried to soothe the Elfling, but he was shaking to badly to stand up. He wasn't supposed to be here anymore; the Elfling had never been here to begin with.

It was far too real to be a nightmare. He could feel the wetness from the forest floor on his bare legs, the warm blood dripping slowly over his fingers from the cut on the Elfling's upper arm. And… Maglor knew what hallucinations felt like. This was too complete, too clear, to be anything but real. And if it was real, then the first order of business had to be wrapping the Elfling's arm. He could handle that.

The child appeared to be about nine years old, so perhaps twenty-five by an Elvish reckoning. He was dwarfed by the heavy robes he had been wearing the last time Maglor had seen him—when he was still a fully grown ellon. No, he wasn’t going to think about that. If he did, he was sure he’d lose it, and the Elfling needed him.

He had to start using the boy’s name eventually, he supposed, tearing one of the thinner pieces of fabric into strips to bind the wound.

“Elrond,” he breathed, jostling the child to get his attention.

The little one looked up at him, eyes wide and wet. “Hurts,” he choked out between sobs.

“I know. I know, I’ll find us some help in the morning, alright?”

Elrond nodded, trusting Maglor to keep to his word. Maglor thought he felt his heart break just a bit when he remembered that he’d only know Elrond for three years at this point in the boy’s life.The first time around, it had taken much longer to gain his trust, and Maglor found himself worrying about the extent of the child’s injuries.

He bandaged the cut as best he could with what he had and bundled the Elfling in the remaining fabric to keep him warm while he slept. There wasn’t much he could do by way of a fire, but the night was dry and windless. He was more worried about their lack of supplies than the elements; if they were where he thought, Yavanna governed the weather. She wouldn’t allow an Elfling to die if she could stop it. But there was no Valar who could ensure food or medical supplies.

When morning came, he would start walking. Six thousand years was too long for him to remember which way was home, but he knew these woods were kept by the House of Finwё, so someone was bound to discover them eventually.

He didn’t know how well he would handle coming face-to-face with people he hadn’t spoken with outside his nightmares for six millenia. He wondered when, from their point of view, they’d last seen him. Had it been a day? A year? A hundred? And how would they react to Elrond?

He stopped himself there. He didn’t even know how far back he’d gone. Perhaps his kin had already left Aman and gone to retrieve the Silmarils from Beleriand. Or perhaps he hadn’t gone back at all, though he couldn’t imagine why Elrond was suddenly nine years old if it was still the beginning of the Fourth Age.

Elrond shifted in his sleep, beaded fabric scraping against Maglor’s left palm. The ellon gasped sharply, pain radiating up his arm. He examined the never-quite-healed burn mark in by the dim light that seemed to pervade the land. Well, at least he had an idea of what time period he was in, then, if Telperion still shone. The not-scar looked  the same as it had for centuries, but it felt as it had just after he had cast his Silmaril to the sea, tender and burning.

He made quick work of wrapping it in one of the strips of fabric he’d left laying on the ground. He knew it likely wouldn’t help, but it was the sentiment that mattered. He settled down with Elrond in his lap, back against a nearby tree, and let himself drift into the realm of Irmo.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote four different versions of this chapter and this is the one I hated the least. (Actually, I really like the bit just before the end so I guess that's a win.)


	3. Chapter Two

When Maglor woke, it was to laughing voices somewhere in the distance. Normally, he would prepare for a fight. However, he could hardly call his current situation normal. He was unarmed and caring for a child in a forest that, while it technically belonged at least partially to him, was almost entirely unfamiliar. He gathered the still sleeping Elrond to his chest, trying not to lose his head at the fact that the once Lord of Imladris was _nine years old,_ and started walking in the opposite direction of the voices.

It wasn’t long before the Elfling woke and demanded to walk on his own. Maglor placed him on the ground and tied off the bottom of the too-long robe, placing a finger to his lips for silence. Elrond nodded dutifully and they continued walking.

He kept his ears trained on the voices. There were three or more, speaking in Noldorin Quenya and getting closer. He shoved down the momentary panic and placed a hand on the Elfling’s back, weaving him through the trees and away from the voices. Elrond looked up at him anxiously and ended up stumbling over something on the ground.

The voices went abruptly silent as Maglor picked Elrond off the ground. There was a soft rustling of leaves and one of the voices spoke up, tone worried and scolding. Maglor would have spared a moment of thought to translate it from Quenya, but he was frozen in place at the name the speaker had started with: Tyelpe. That meant that, whatever time he’d come back to, Celebrimbor was already born and old enough to go on a hunt. Which meant in turn that there couldn’t be long before Fёanor started work on the Silmarils, if he hadn’t already. And what a grim thought that was, that he might be sent back with a young Elrond and be unable to protect him from all that the Silmarils had initially caused.

There was another round of rustling and Maglor was drawn from his reverie. He directed Elrond behind a tree just to the side, where he would be out of sight to whoever was coming but also, more importantly, where Maglor could keep an eye on him and protect him if something went wrong. The Elfling wore a frightened expression, watching Maglor with wide eyes that were no less sharp for fear.

Maglor turned to face the patch of bushes that rustled softly with the person’s approach. He was entirely unprepared for a fight, unarmed and dressed in only a nightshirt, not to mention the sharp, unignorable ache that had settled in his left arm during the night. A fight suddenly became the least of his concerns, however, when an ellon with bright golden hair stepped in to view, bow fully drawn and arrow trained firmly on Maglor. But he didn’t fire, eyes widening almost comically and mouth dropping open in shock.

For his part, Maglor wasn’t faring much better. He was standing face-to-face with one of his younger brothers, whose funeral he’d attended so many millennia ago. How many times had he wished to see him again, staying up well into the morning pleading with the Valar to take him or give his brothers back, and now he stood dumbstruck when given the chance he’d begged for for so long.

“Tyelkormo?” called the voice from before. Curufin, a calmer,more rational part of Maglor’s mind supplied. He could feel his heart racing as Celegorm struggled for a reply, bow not straying from its intended target even as his voice trembled.

“I think you need to come here, Curufinwё,” he said finally, voice stronger than he’d probably expected. Then, almost as an afterthought, “Bring Tyelpe.”

Maglor’s breath caught and he whipped his head around to watch for his brother and nephew to appear. He didn’t have to wait long. Curufin approached cautiously, arm out to keep Celebrimbor behind him as the Elfling peeked around to see what was happening. He stopped dead as soon as he was close enough to see Maglor, expression mirroring Celegorm’s. Celebrimbor, watching from just behind his father, gaped.

“Uncle?” the boy asked disbelievingly.

Maglor was beginning to feel somewhat hysterical, though he imagined he was entitled given that all three of the people he was looking at right now were long since dead. He flicked a glance to Elrond and the Elfling moved tentatively into view, clutching Maglor’s left hand tightly in the face of a new group of people.

Two things happened at once then. Celegorm’s hand slackened and the arrow flew, and the combination of shock and pain finally got to Maglor, dropping him to the ground in a dead faint. The timing was rather excellent, for the arrow just grazed Maglor, passing over Elrond’s head as the Elfling knelt in worry.

And everything erupted into chaos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am... not content with this chapter. But I had to move on.


	4. Chapter Three

Telperinquar watched the events immediately following his uncle’s collapse in silent, wide-eyed shock.

Uncle Tyelkormo dropped his bow, grabbing for Uncle Makalaurё as he fell but missing. Atar hit his knees hard in his haste to be sure Uncle Makalaurё was alright, but the strange Elfling shoved his hands away, the Elfling’s own hands fluttering over Uncle Makalaurё’s chest in a panic, wanting to do something but clearly not knowing what.

Atar, after being shoved away twice more and when the unfamiliar Elfling started to tear up, grabbed the child and carried him a few steps away, allowing Uncle Tyelkormo to check over their older brother. The Elfling screamed in a language none of them recognised, pulling at Atar’s hair and kicking at his legs.

Telperinquar jumped forward then, torn from his shock by the younger boy’s shrieking. He secured the Elfling’s arms to his sides until the little one stopped fighting some, careful of where the right one was tied in makeshift bandages, then held him in place while Atar and Uncle Tyelkormo checked over Uncle Makalaurё.

The Elfling was tiny and strange looking, Telperinquar thought as he examined the child. If Uncle Makalaurë was the father, it didn't show. The child was darker of skin and lighter of hair and very ambiguous of face. While he looked like a regular Elfling overall, there was something distinctly non-elfin about him. He was younger than Telperinquar, but not by too much; the new child looked perhaps twenty-five or twenty-six years old to his thirty-three.

What concerned Telperinuar rather a bit more than the boy's age, however, was that he was starting to cry. He babbled softly in his odd language, similar enough to Quenya that a few words were recognizable, but Telperinquar was sure that Indatar Fёanáro would have a fit if he heard it. One word in particular stuck out to him, one that the boy repeated over and over in between the others: “Ada”. It sounded similar enough to Atar, and there was only one person in the area the Elfling could reasonably be referring to: Uncle Makalaurё.

The walk back to Fёanáro’s home was quiet. The Elfling, as yet unnamed, clung to Telperinquar, adamantly resisting all of Tyelkormo’s attempts to take him. The third son of Fёanáro had taken one look at the boy’s bare feet and decided that he must be carried. The Elfling was staunchly opposed to this idea, crossing his arms and glaring up at Tyelkormo and proving that “no” was a fairly universal term.

Telperinquar, for his part, made a valiant effort at carrying the boy. He took all of the child’s squirming and wailing rather well, but eventually gave in and put the Elfling on the ground, holding the child’s hand as he walked. The younger boy was panicky, but cooperative so long as Makalaurё remained within his sight.

He chattered softly in his strange language, but it seemed more to fill the silence than anything. Occasionally, Tyelpe would hear a word that he knew, but not often enough to know what the boy was talking about. By the time they were nearly there, he had gone utterly silent, half running to keep up with Curufinwё’s long strides. Tyelpe scooped him up then. He was little more than a head taller than the boy, but his legs were long enough to keep up with his father. The Elfling protested at first, but settled as soon as he realized why Telperinquar had picked him up.

* * *

Of all the things Fёanáro had expected when he suggested that Tyelkormo and Curufinwё take Telperinquar out hunting that morning—injuries, disasters, even divine intervention—for them to return with a strange new Elfling in tow was very low on the list. Low on the list, but still something he could handle. He  _ wasn’t  _ sure he could handle Curufinwё carrying an unconscious Makalaurё through the house to the Halls of Healing, but here they were.

“Where did he come from?” he asked, not sure whether he was referring to the Elfling or his second son. Tyelkormo had run to get the rest of their brothers as soon as they had arrived and Fёanáro had been left to follow Curufinwё and Telperinquar as they carried their respective charges through corridors and up flights of stairs.

Curufinwё only pursed his lips at the question, so he turned to his  _ indya.  _ Tyelpe, a bit breathless, adjusted the Elfling on his hip. The child had worn himself out with panic during the walk back to the house, and now he lay half asleep against Telperinquar’s shoulder, listening intently to the conversation around him even though he’d shown no evidence of speaking Quenya.

“We don’t know, Indatar. We heard a noise, then Uncle Tyelkormo turned a corner and called us over and Uncle Makalaurё was just standing there. And then the Elfing walked out from behind a tree and grabbed his hand and he dropped like a rock,” he recounted.

“Does this mysterious little one have a name?”

Tyelpe tried to shrug, then winced as the smaller child’s weight shifted with the motion.

“You are still an Elfling yourself, and not much bigger than he is,” Fёanáro observed. “I could take him for you.” He reached over to brush a strand of brown hair out of the sleepy Elfling’s face.

“And you are hardly bigger than I,” Tyelpe shot back good naturedly, grinning when Fëanáro scrunched up his nose in mock offense.

The Elfling squirmed again and Tyelpe cast Fëanáro a look that was some cross between pleading and grateful. The ellon gathered the child into his arms. The Elfing grabbed at Telperinquar’s shirt in a moment of worry, glancing forward to where Curufinwё carried Makalaurё, but Telperinquar made soothing noises and after a moment the Elfling settled against Fёanáro’s chest.

Tyelpe was silent as they continued to walk and Fёanáro withdrew into his thoughts. The Elfling nodding off in his arms was certainly a mystery: nameless, to his knowledge apparently mute, and wandering about the wood, injured, with the son Fёanáro hadn’t seen in twelve years. His mind drifted to Makalaurё then, and the last time he had seen his second son.

It had been twelve years ago. Makalaurё had gone into the forest for quiet while he composed his newest set of songs. Fёanáro and Nerdanel had seen him off with smiles that had faded as the day progressed. Makalaurё hadn’t returned that night, or any night since.

Nerdanel had left three years later. She had gone to visit her father in his forges and two months later Fёanáro had received a letter stating that she would not be returning. Her children were grown, one of them with a wife and child of his own, and she was grieving the loss of their Makalaurё. He understood, he truly did, but it still hurt.

And now their Makalaurё had returned. He was scarred and unconscious and barely dressed and he had brought a strange new child with him, but he had come home. Fёanáro would make sure he was well before sending word to anyone, especially Nerdanel. He would not call his wife home only for her to suffer once again the loss of her child.

Tyelpe ran ahead of them and threw open the doors to the Halls of Healing, startling the healers therein. Curufinwё entered a moment later, Fёanáro close on his heels. The healers were straight to business, arranging Makalaurё on a bed and examining him. The Elfling squirmed out of Fёanáro’s hold and darted to Makalaurё’s side, climbing into the bed and holding the ellon’s left hand—the bandaged one—to his chest.

One of the healers tried to negotiate with him to be allowed to examine the hand, but the Elfling shook his head firmly. Upon the elleth’s repeated attempts, Fёanáro realized that the child was not, in fact, mute, but foreign. He made himself understood rather well despite the language barrier, and the healer was forced to accept that she was not going to see Makalaurё’s hand any time soon. Giving up on that course of action, the elleth examined the Elfling instead. He was wary, but didn’t fight her, which she was glad of.

There was a cut on his arm, short but quite deep, and it would need two or three stitches. She went to fetch a needle and thread, searching also for a proper sleeping robe that would fit the Elfling. It was not her business to pry into her Lord’s family, but the torn, dirtied, too-large robes the boy wore now were hardly serviceable, let alone appropriate. She found what she was looking for and returned to the bed.

The Elfling flinched when she wiped at the area around the cut with a wet cloth, but remained within her reach. She poured an anesthetic over the area and waited several minutes for it to take effect. She held up the needle, letting the Elfling watch her thread it before she started. He nodded and clenched his eyes shut while she worked. She tapped him on the shoulder when he finished and he looked at clean white bandage curiously. She smiled at him and gave him the folded sleeping robe, then moved away to report to Lord Fёanáro.

He shot up from the chair he had taken when he noticed her approach. “There is news?” he asked expectantly.

She nodded. “Lord Makalaurё is well enough; I believe the only thing for him is time. He should wake tonight or early tomorrow morning.”

Fёanáro frowned. “The- the hand? The left one, it-”

The healer hesitated. “The Elfling would not allow me to see it, my lord. However, if I were to guess by his overall condition, it is likely not terribly bad.”

Fёanáro nodded. “And what of the Elfling?”

“There are three small stitches in his arm but nothing else, my lord.”

Fёanáro dropped into his chair, sagging with relief. “Thank you, Healer Aurhên.”

She bowed and returned to her work station.

And that was when the door opened to admit the five sons of Fёanáro who were not already in the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to get this out yesterday but that just didn't happen. The first like... third of this is from Tyelpe's POV and then the rest is not.
> 
> Useful information below!
> 
> Quenya Translations
> 
> Indatar - grandfather (roughly, I had to extrapolate a bit since there's no official Quenya word of grandfather)
> 
> indya - grandchild
> 
> Regarding Elvish aging: I read somewhere that Elves reach majority around fifty. This makes Tyelpe, thirty-three, about the equivalent of a human twelve-year-old. Elrond is half human, which means that, at least in my story, he would reach majority at the regular human eighteen, but Tyelpe doesn't know this. His estimate of twenty-six puts Elrond at about nine years old by a human reckoning, which he is. I don't know how elvish nine-and-twelve-year-olds act, but I know how I acted and nine and twelve, so that's kind of what I'm going off of.
> 
> Regarding Tyelpe's "You're hardly bigger than me" statement: My Feanor is short. I don't know when or why I decided this, but I did. In my mind, most of the House of Finwe are actually really tiny by Elvish standards. Not all, but most.
> 
> You may be asking why Nerdanel isn't here. Don't worry. She'll be in the next chapter or the one after that. Right now, I'm still figuring out how I want to write her, but she will be in this story an she will be important.
> 
> Healer Aurhen: I didn't actually mean to name her, but I've had that name in mind for an Elf OC for a while. I don't think she'll play a major part in the story, but she will be around.


	5. Chapter Four

His sons entered in a panic, Nelyafinwё in the front with Tyelkormo running behind him trying to explain the situation and the other three not far behind.

Nelyafinwё made a beeline for where his father was sitting. “Tyelko said we needed to come to the Halls of Healing,” he said, looking down at Fёanáro, eyes wide.

Fёanáro stood, grabbing his eldest son by the arms and shaking him lightly. He knew how Nelyafinwё could get. “Be calm,  _ ionya _ . Much has happened, but all is well.”

Nelyafinwё let out a breath and nodded. He looked around the room for the first time and caught sight of Curufinwё and Telperinquar conversing quietly a few feet away, both whole and healthy. He looked relieved for a moment, then realization passed over his face and looked back at Fёanáro in concern.

“Who is hurt?” he asked, glancing between his brother and nephew and his father.

Tyelkormo looked up from where he was bent double trying to catch his breath from the run. “I tried to explain, Atto, but he ran off before I could,” he said.

“It is alright,  _ pitya min. _ I will explain.” Then he turned to Nelyafinwё with a slight smile. “Sit,  _ ionya.  _ We don’t need someone else fainting from shock.”

Nelyafinwё’s frown deepened, but he did as he was told. Morifinwё and the Ambarussa settled on the floor around the chair their older brother occupied and looked up at Fёanáro expectantly.

Fёanáro floundered for a moment, not quite sure how to start. “Your brother- There-” he cut himself off with a sigh, running a hand through his hair. He looked to the bed occupied by Makalaurё and the strange foreign Elfling. “Makalaurё has returned,” he finally said, preparing himself for the inevitable barrage of questions.

“Where is he?”

“When!”

“How!”

“Is he alright?”

“What happened?!”

Fёanáro held up his hands for silence. “Tyelkormo came across him near the river a few hours ago. He is asleep right now, but he is well. Ah!” He flung out an arm to stop his sons from going to their brother. “I have not finished,” he said, meeting each of their eyes sternly. They sat, but he could feel their impatience. “When he- When Tyelkormo found him, there was someone with him. An Elfling.”

The reaction to that was unanimous. “What?!”

Fёanáro nodded. “The Elfling is injured and frightened and does not speak Quenya well, if he speaks it at all. He is in the bed with Makalaurё. If he is awake, try not to upset him.” He looked at them, waiting for an acknowledgement of his words. There was a collective nod. “ _ Now  _ you may go to your brother.”

He, Curufinwё, and Telperinquar hung back while the rest of his sons crowded around Makalaurё’s bed.

* * *

The first thing Maglor did upon waking was catalogue his surroundings to the best of his ability without opening his eyes. He didn’t remember what exactly had happened, but he had learned long ago that waking from unconsciousness with no information was never a good situation to be in.

He was in a bed with someone small curled up next to him, breath even in sleep. Pain rang through his left side, but it was dull and easily ignored. A light breeze filled the air with the scent of flowers, but not strongly enough to mask the sharp smell of medicine undercut by that of years of blood. It was likely that he was in an infirmary, then. And with the sleeping child to his left, his mind went straight to Himring. He turned his head to the side and opened his eyes, fully expecting to see Maedhros and whichever twin was not in his bed sitting at his bedside, as they always were when he woke from a major injury.

Instead, his eyes met those of Celegorm and the Ambarussa, the subject of their eager scrutiny. Memory returned abruptly and he shot upright. His legs were over the side of the bed before he was hit by the dizziness that accompanies a sudden return to consciousness. A dozen hands grabbed at him and he closed his eyes tightly as he waited for the spinning to stop. When he opened them again, eight concerned faces filled his vision. His brothers and father and nephew.

They spoke to him all at once in Quenya and he scrunched his brow in confusion while he tried to translate. Mae- Nelyafinwё saw his expression and called for silence. 

_ “Narildё mai, toron?” _

_ Are you well? _ He could answer that easily enough. It took only a moment to string together a proper response. His Quenya was rusty, but not entirely unused. “ _ Teln na _ ,” he replied.  _ I will be. _

There were several smiles in response and he had only the barest seconds of warning before the twins sprung forward and trapped him in a hug, speaking too quickly for him to catch all of the words. That seemed to break some unseen barrier, because then his family were climbing onto his bed behind him and kneeling on the floor in front of him and leaning in awkwardly from his either side, all trying to get into the embrace and at least half in tears. He clung to them just as desperately, still not entirely convinced that this was real, that he wouldn’t wake up alone at any moment.

The sleeping Elfling shifted suddenly and Maglor sucked in a breath over his teeth. He had forgotten for a moment, in all of the emotion, that Elrond was here with him. He moved, loathe to let go of his brothers but knowing that he had to be there for Elrond when the boy woke. He poked at Tyelkormo and Morifinwё—Valar, it was strange to call them by their Quenya names again—until they moved off of the bed. Then he shook Elrond lightly, acutely aware that he was being watched by everyone in the room.

* * *

Elrond woke easily, as he always had, and took in his surroundings quickly, noting all of the curious, unfamiliar faces. But… Ada didn’t look worried. He sat uncomfortably for a moment, letting the—he quickly counted them off—eight ellyn oggle him. Something about them felt disconcertingly familiar, though he wasn’t sure yet if it was in a good way or a bad way.

He quickly became bored at being stared at as though he were some new type of bug, and besides that he had questions. Most pressingly, where was he? When he turned to his Ada to ask, the ellyn around them started up a conversation in Quenya. He recognised the language easily enough and even understood a portion of the words. Living in Himring, it was hard not to pick up at least a little Quenya, but his naneth had told him a long time ago that it was “not appropriate for someone of his station to speak the language of the kinslayers.”

Resolved to ignore the ellyn, he looked at his Ada, wondering which of his questions to ask first.

* * *

“Where are Elros and Maedhros?”

Maglor had expected questions. From his father, his brothers, Elrond. But he hadn’t expected that to be the first. He didn’t have an answer. Elros wasn’t even born yet. Elrond wasn’t  _ supposed  _ to be. Neither were Tuor or Beren or Lúthien and Idril was just a baby if she was even born either, let alone Eärendil and Elwing.

His brothers’ attention was back on him. He sighed heavily and answered in Quenya. He knew Elrond knew enough of the language for this, and he may as well get him used to it. He had no idea how long they would be here, if they would ever go back at all. He made his answer as truthful as he could.

“I don’t know,  _ ionya.  _ Somewhere far away.”

Elrond looked thoughtful. He asked his next question in hesitant Quenya.  _ “Yá telmё enatú?” When will we see them again? _

The grammar was poor and the accent worse, but it was certainly understandable. But that wasn’t what Maglor was worried about. When, Elrond had asked. He didn’t want to break the boy’s heart, but he couldn’t find it within himself to lie.

“I don’t think we will,  _ pitya min. _

He watched as Elrond translated the sentence, then processed it, and he was waiting with open arms when he broke. He held the Elfling tightly, whispering comfort in both Sindarin and Quenya. He didn’t try to hold back his own tears and barely noticed when the room went utterly, respectfully silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This didn't really turn out how I wanted it to, but I think it's okay anyway.
> 
> Sindarin translations:
> 
> ellyn - male elf (plural)
> 
> ada - affectionate form of father
> 
> Quenya translations:
> 
> ionya - son
> 
> pitya min - little one
> 
> Narildё mai, toron? - Are you well, brother?
> 
> Teln na. - I will be. (literally I intend to be.)
> 
> Yá telmё enatú? - When will we see them again?


	6. Chapter Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From here on out, nothing is set in stone, so if there's anything you want to see in this story, let me know and I'll try to include as many suggestions as possible!

“What ails you, _seldёnya_?”

Nerdanel startled. She had been so caught up in the sudden, strange wash of feeling that she hadn’t heard her father enter the workshop. He wove between the half-finished sculptures and the board that she’d pinned her sketches to. When he reached her, he bent down to pick up her dropped chisel and hammer, looking at them analytically. He placed them on the table and sat down on the bench beside his daughter, waiting for her to speak.

“Something feels _wrong_ , Atto,” Nerdanel said, leaning on Mahtan’s shoulder.

He looked at the marble effigy she was working on and wrapped an arm around her. “Is it about your project?”

Nerdanel scrunched up her nose. “Of course not,” she laughed. Then she sobered. “I don’t know what it is. I was working and I had this… feeling. Like something is happening and I should be involved. What should I do, Atto?”

Mahtan hummed softly in consideration. “Well,” he started, “I think that if I was meant to interfere in whatever it is that’s happening to you, then I would have felt it, too. You must do this on your own, but I am always here for you, _seldёnya._ ”

He spoke as though he knew something she didn’t, and Nerdanel felt more at ease knowing that her father was willing to help her. She smiled at him. “Thank you, Atto.”

He stood, sketching her an exaggerated bow. “You are quite welcome, my dear. Now, my original reason for coming here was to invite you to see the latest project of Aulё’s smiths. It is quite spectacular, if you are interested.” Mahtan knew that his daughter didn’t often enjoy visiting the forge, for it reminded her of her husband and sons—one of whom had been dead so many awful years—but he _was_ rather proud of this latest accomplishment.

It seemed his daughter was in a favorable mood; her smile widened and she stood gracefully, dusting her chalky hands on her leggings. “But of course. If it is as wonderful as you say, it must be a sight to behold indeed.”

They walked to the forge in silence, Nerdanel too lost in thought to speak. One of Aulё’s Maiar greeted them when they arrived, leading them through to the Vala’s workstation with a proud grin. Several others, both Eldar and Maiar, were already gathered around, admiring a large, smooth yellow-green stone in a finely filligreed silver setting. Aulё himself was sitting two tables down, bent over what Nerdanel assumed was a sketch for his next project. She noted that the pendant in front of her glowed softly, but that was hardly remarkable when looking at the work of Aulё. Nerdanel raised a brow, turning to her father with a wry smile.

“A pendant? Atto, you’ve given me one nearly the same for my last begetting day. Surely it must do something fantastical, then, to be worth such note as to interrupt my work.”

It wasn’t phrased as a question, but it was most certainly an attempt to gain information. Information which the smiths were apparently all too happy to give. They all began to speak at once, her father included, too excitable and overlapped for her to understand a word. Aulё glanced up and the sudden cacophony and smiled fondly when he caught sight of Nerdanel at the middle of it all, arms crossed with a amused and challenging expression on her fair face.

* * *

The Vala was reminded by a sudden mental prod from his wife that he was meant to speak to Lady Nerdanel about certain events. He easily parted the crowd around her and her father.

“Now, what is it that has caused all of this noise?” he asked cheerfully.

Lady Nerdanel curtsied to him, but her exasperated smile never left. “This pendant seems rather plain, my lord. I simply asked what makes it so exceptional.”

Now the challenging look was turned on the Vala himself. He grinned. He was rather proud of the necklace. He and his smiths had been commissioned by Vairё, Nienna, and Estё to craft it. They had told him in no uncertain terms that it was to go to the mother of Kanafinwё Makalaurё, and though neither Valiё would say why, he could certainly guess.

“Well, Lady, I shall start with the stone. Gaspeite tends to be quite… magical. It is said to give the wearer visions of the future, and even make one’s wishes for the future come true, though I cannot prove that claim. It also has healing properties, of wounds both physical and emotional.”

Lady Nerdanel’s expression had turned speculative. Her eyes twinkled similarly to how her husband’s did before doing something he knew the Valar would not like. Aulё resolved to keep an eye on her—not that he hadn’t been since the Valar’s recent… mistake. He resumed his explanation

“Silver, as your respected father has likely told you, has similar properties. It can also enhance the powers of the stone and create a proper link between stone and wearer. This necklace was designed with a purpose, Lady, though what purpose I may not say.”

Lady Nerdanel nodded, mind somewhere distant but still focused on the pendant. She seemed unlikely to come back to the present any time soon, and Aulё gave a prompting nod to her father. Mahtan closed the necklace in its box, placing it in his daughter’s hands.

Lady Nerdanel’s eyes went wide. “For me?” she breathed almost reverently.

Aulё inclined his head. “I would speak with you outside, Lady. You are wise far beyond your years, certainly you have noticed that the world feels amiss these past two days?”

She nodded, hardly breathing.

“Walk with me, then, and I will explain it to you as best I can.” The Vala offered her his arm with a sound like grinding stone. Lady Nerdanel shifted her box to one hand and took it, scarcely flinching at the heat of the fire that ran in his blood.

His Maiar moved aside to make a path and Mahtan walked with them as far as the door, where he brushed a kiss over his daughter’s brow and said, “I am here should you have need of me, _seldёnya._ ”

Aulё continued to lead Lady Nerdanel for several minutes, offering her a seat on a garden bench when he was certain that they were far enough from the forge as not to be overheard by his Maiar or the smiths.

They sat in silence for several minutes before either of them spoke, Lady Nerdanel deferring to the Vala and Aulë trying to figure out where to begin.

“Your son—” he broke off, realizing that it was a poor start.

“I have many sons,” Lady Nerdanel shot back in cold politeness, her good mood thoroughly soured by the reminder of the child she had lost. But Aulë had expected such a reaction; it was why he had cut himself off two words into his explanation.

He schooled his expression to one of sympathy. Lady Nerdanel scoffed lightly and turned away.

“Lady,” he said firmly, turning her to face him, “there is much you need to know, and it will be easier for us both if you cooperate.”

She sighed and her shoulders slumped.. “Very well. I will listen.”

“Would you like to put on your necklace?”

Lady Nerdanel frowned at the sudden change of subject, but opened the box obediently.

“I fear you will not believe me without the magic,” he explained. She nodded, appearing satisfied with that.

When the necklace was on, Lady Nerdanel looked at him expectantly. He huffed out a sigh. “You’re son,” he started, then trailed off for a moment. “Makalaurë has returned to your family’s estate.”

The enchantment of the necklace overcame her, and she knew Aulë’s words to be true.

* * *

“That’s the last of it,” Mahtan said, passing a bag to his daughter and rechecking the cinches on her saddle.

“I will be alright,” she said, fond exasperation coloring her tone. “I am only travelling to King Finwë’s lands. It is far, but the road is not dangerous. You know this, Atto.”

Mahtan smiled, walking with her to the gates of the estate. “I do, _seldёnya,_ but you are my youngest, and you know well how parents hold their youngest children so dear.”

Nerdanel bent down to tighten the laces on her boots, then swung herself into the saddle. “I must be off. You will come to visit this summer?”

“Of course _._ May your journey take you safely home, _hínanya_ _._ ”

Mahtan watched his daughter ride out, heart lighter than it had been in nearly a decade, and smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I'm taking suggestions! Anyone you want Maglor and/or Elrond to interact with, memories from Middle-earth you want them to deal with, maybe you want one of them to slip up and reveal something, or show off skills they learned in Middle-earth, or just anything at all you'd like to see, let me know. I'll try to include as many suggestions as possible because I really like making my readers happy.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> seldёnya - my daughter
> 
> Atto - affectionate form of father
> 
> hínanya - my child
> 
> Regarding Mahtan's "you're my youngest" statement: Y'know what ticked me off the most about the Hobbit movies? That Tauriel had red hair when it's stated that red hair is pretty much unique to Nerdanel's family. To ease my mind about this, I've decided to headcanon that Nerdanel had an older sibling who's descendents actually survived the First Age.
> 
> Regarding the dynamic between Aulё, Mahtan, and Nerdanel: Mahtan and Nerdanel have the best father-daughter relationship ever. Mahtan is a super supportive dad and Nedanel loves her father very much. Mahtan is definitely Aulё's favorite smith (not that either of them would actually say it) so Aulё, to Nerdanel, is like that one friend of your parents who isn't related to you but is absolutely your uncle. He still refers to her as Lady Nerdanel, though, because she's married to the crown prince of the Noldor and it's respectful.
> 
> Regarding the estate mentioned at the end: I sort of headcanon that all of Aulё's smiths/Maiar live in or around his halls.
> 
> Aulё was "commissioned" by Estё, Nienna, and Vairё: The Valar don't need money, so this term is used very loosely.
> 
> Gaspeite and silver: I actually did research this. If you want to look it up for yourself, you can refer to the following.
> 
> https://meanings.crystalsandjewelry.com/gaspeite/
> 
> https://www.indigomoonjewels.com/blogs/news/silver-metaphysical-properties-and-powers


	7. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still taking suggestions! If there's something you want to see, let me know!

When both Makalaurё and the Elfling—still unnamed—had calmed, Fёanáro asked Healer Aurhên to arrange for dinner to be brought up. She bowed and left. He watched his second son and the Elfling who was apparently his second grandchild, half listening to his sons’ speculative conversations around him.

Makalaurё looked jaded even as he smiled at his son’s words—they had switched back to the boy’s native language. What skin was visible was scarred and much more tanned than it had been before. He was still thin, but it was all hard muscle, as though he’d eaten too little and fought too much. He held himself with a quiet power, giving the impression that the disheveled infirmary cot and dirty nightshirt could serve as a king’s throne and robes should he so choose. But he was also wary, eyes darting to the windows and doors periodically and fingers curling in the sheets, grasping as if for a weapon. The most drastic change Fёanáro noticed, though, was in Makalaurё’s eyes. Makalaurё could make his face utterly blank and shield his mind from the best of the best, but his eyes had always been expressive. Now they held a depth of wisdom that Fёanáro hadn’t seen even in the oldest of the Eldar he had met. They held sorrow and pain, but also greatest happiness, and Fёanáro wondered what his son had been through in the years away.

The Elfling didn’t look like Makalaurё in the slightest. His coloring, with his dark brown hair and olive skin, wasn’t warm enough to be Vanyar, but too warm to be Noldor. He certainly wasn’t Teleri and all of the Avari lived in distant Beleriand. His ears were short, but undeniably pointed, and he had intelligent hazel eyes that didn’t miss a thing despite his young age. He exuded a strange aura, like a diluted version of the effect that Maiar tended to bring about. This child would grow up to be devastatingly powerful, if he wasn’t already. He had scars as well, though far fewer than Makalaurё did, and Fёanáro had felt the slight calluses on the child’s hands when he had carried him earlier. Wherever he and Makalaurё had been before coming home, it was not nearly as idyllic as Finwё’s family lands were.

Aurhên returned before he could further speculate on that point, having roped a procession of guards and servants into carrying tables, trays, and chairs to the Halls of Healing. Curufinwё and Morifinwё’s wives were at the back and they took over once everything had entered the room. Sarnayeldё, Curufinwё’s wife, took charge of the guards who were carrying furniture while Herenyanel, Morifinwё’s wife, directed the servants who carried trays of food and dishes. Aurhên kept everyone out of the way, her expression daring Tyelkormo and the twins to try and make mischief.

At last, everything had a place and the servants and guards had been herded out the door. Fёanáro glanced at Makalaurё, who hadn’t moved from the bed. He wore a slightly stupefied expression.

“Why are you just staring like that?” Tyelkormo asked.

Makalaurё flashed him a teasing smile. “I suppose I had forgotten that everything is a production with this family.”

Tyelko’s face fell for just an instant, then he darted over to sling an arm around his brother’s shoulders. “Well,” he said, “You won’t be missing anymore of our ‘productions,’ alright?”

Makalaurё softened, truly relaxed, for the first time since they’d found him, curled against his brother’s side as Herenyanel passed everyone a plate. She paused upon seeing the Elfling, shooting Makalaurё a jokingly scandalized look, then moved on.

When the meal began, Herenyanel was the first to speak. “ _ Veruháno, _ ” she began, her tone charming as ever but laced with intense curiosity, “Where did the Elfling come from?”

Makalaurё opened and closed his mouth several times, then settled on, “He’s mine.”

Curufinwё immediately pointed out the flaw in that claim. “He’s, what, twenty-six years old? You haven’t been gone long enough to have sired him.”

Makalaurё furrowed his brows and tilted his head. “Gone?” Then his expression turned faraway and darkly reminiscent.

Nelyafinwё frowned, reaching out to place a hand on Makalaurё’s knee. “Laurё? Are you alright?”

Makalaurё shook his head to clear away the cobwebs of memory. “I’m fine.”

Nelyo looked sceptical, but accepted the answer. “Don’t you remember? You disappeared. We searched everywhere, but we couldn’t find you.”

Makalaurё shook his head slowly. “I don’t…” he trailed off, still shaking his head.

Tyelko, who still had an arm around Makalaurё’s shoulders, jostled him lightly. “It’s alright. You’re back now, and we’re not going to lose you again.”

Makalaurё nodded and there was silence for a moment. “How long was I gone?” he asked softly.

“Twelve years,  _ ionya.  _ You really don’t remember?”

“It-” he swallowed roughly. “It felt like a lot longer.”

“That still doesn’t answer the question of the child,” Sarnayeldё broke in when the ensuing silence began to grow awkward.

Telperinquar reached over and tapped the Elfling on the shoulder. The boy turned to him, expression expectant. “ _ Alá? _ ”

“How old are you?” Tyelpe asked, careful to enunciate, remembering the smaller boy’s lack of skill in Quenya.

“Nine,” he said matter-of-factly, returning to his meal without care for the uproar his answer had caused.

“Mustn’t be an Elf,” Telufinwё muttered close to Pityafinwё’s ear.

Pityafinwё hummed. “What sort of creature do you suppose it is, then? And what might we call it?”

Makalaurё jerked away from Tyelko’s side and glared at the Ambarussa. His arm curled protectively around the boy, and when he spoke, his tone was sharp and dangerous. “ _ He  _ is called Elrond, and he is my  _ son _ ,” he snapped viciously. “You  _ will not  _ say such things of him again.”

The twins looked at him, their eyes wide, and nodded quickly.

Sarnayeldё frowned. “He looks halfway to his maturity. How can he be only nine years old?” she asked, tone cautious but respectful.

Makalaurё got the look on his face again like he had when Herenyanel had asked where the boy—Elrond—had come from, like he didn’t know quite what to say. He sighed heavily and flicked a glance to Elrond’s face, which was carefully impassive as he listened to the conversation. “His mother,” Makalaurё began hesitantly, “she was one of the Secondborn. The mortals among Ilúvatar’s Children.” He shrunk away slightly when he looked up long enough to catch his family’s shocked expressions, but held his ground.

“Makalaurё?” Morifinwё asked thinly, “Where in Aman have you  _ been  _ all these years?” And then, more to himself than anything, “A mortal woman… _unbelievable_.”

Elrond’s blank facade went out the window and his mouth dropped open mid-bite with no care for propriety or manners.  _ “Aman?  _ We’re in  _ Aman?!” _

Fёanáro looked to his second born, eyes wide in shock but still calculating as they ever were. “What does your boy mean to say,  _ ionya _ ?” he asked, tones carefully measured.

Makalaurё drew his shoulders up to his ears and then dropped them with a sigh. “Well… I  _ suppose _ that…  _ technically…  _ I haven’t actually…  _ been _ in Aman.” He clenched his eyes tightly shut and winced, bracing himself for the inevitable explosion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sarnayeldё - Curufin's wife and Celebrimbor's mother. She has dark hair, fair skin, and a severe face. She has a taste for luxury and she's very intelligent. She projects an emotionless air to all but her husband and son. Some people believe the marriage to be one of political convenience since she is from a prominent noble family, but those people would be wrong. Her name means "Daughter of Stone" and, fittingly, she is an unparalleled stone mason.
> 
> Herenyanel - Caranthir's wife. She has black hair and tanned skin and a youthful face. Her calm and patient demeanor is a good contrast to her husband's bold and brazen one. She is an only child, and not of the nobility. Her name means "Thrice Fortunate" because her mother foresaw that she would be blessed with great luck three times in her life.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Veruháno - brother-by-law (literally husband's brother)
> 
> Alá - Yes?
> 
> Ionya - my son
> 
> I checked and double checked and triple checked and couldn't find a reason that the Eldar in Aman couldn't know of the existence of mortal peoples.
> 
> Telufinwё - Amrod's father name, meaning "Last Finwё"
> 
> Pityafinwё - Amras's father name, meaning "Small Finwё"


	8. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A collection of moments on the road to Tirion while the Feanorians get to know Maglor and Elrond a little better.

Maglor closed his eyes and prayed that his family wouldn’t take the news too badly. Of course, Finwёans never did anything by halves. He waited out the shouting and swearing the threats against whoever had taken him and accusations that he was an imposter. He braced himself to be quizzed up one side and down the other by all of his siblings. But to his surprise, the questions never came.

When the din died down and the expected questions were not forthcoming, Maglor opened his eyes—to the unremarkable sight of Morifinwё passing a plate of rolls to Tyelkormo.

“What…?” he asked, unused to his family taking anything so calmly.

Fёanáro was muttering softly under his breath, wearing the expression that only appeared when he had just conceived a new project. Nelyafinwё shoved him lightly to get his attention and his head snapped up to meet Maglor’s eyes, his own bright with delight.

“Makalaurё! There’s so much to do! Your rooms will need to be cleaned and you’ll need a new wardrobe, too, you’re thinner than you used to be, and Elrond as well, of course, he  _ is _ fourth in line for the throne, after all, he must look presentable, and- Oh! Oh, he’ll need a suite of rooms in the family wing, we’ll have to add on to the house, that’s going to take weeks… Ah, we can go to visit the rest of the family in Tirion for a bit once that’s started, they’ll want to know you’ve returned, too…”

He continued to go on, debating the details with himself, but Maglor had mostly stopped listening, fondness swelling in his chest at the almost unreal sight of his father smiling in genuine excitement. After the Silmarils, Fёanor had worn such an expression but rarely, and Maglor hadn’t realized how much he had missed it. The Silmarils… Maglor had been sent back. He must be meant to change things. But he hadn’t the slightest idea of how to stop anything that the Silmarils had caused. Elrond could help, but he was far too young now for the courtly manipulations he had been so adept at when Gil-galad had been High King. Oh, and that was a headache waiting to happen, thinking in the past tense of someone who in all likeliness hadn’t even been born yet.

He sighed. There was so much that had to happen and so much that mustn’t, but it had been so long that he couldn’t even remember all of the histories. However… Elrond might. The boy had heard some of the stories from himself and Maedhros and more from his tutors, and if he did remember more than it seemed, then between them they might be able to put together enough information for a plan.

“Makalaurё!” Pityafinwё called, jerking him out of his musings. Most everyone gathered was looking at Maglor, and he noticed that even Fёanáro had gone quiet.

Telufinwё broke in when they had his attention. “Are you alright? You got that look again like you were remembering something bad.”

Maglor took a deep breath and put on his smile again. “I’m fine,  _ toron _ . Nothing to concern yourself with.” It didn’t look like they believed him.

* * *

When Healer Aurhên had decided that both he and Elrond were well enough to be released, his brothers immediately began planning activities together. Tyelpe and Elrond got on like a house on fire, and Maglor rarely saw either of them on the occasion that he managed to get away from his brothers. They always had, of course, before Eregion fell, so he supposed that it wasn’t much of a surprise.

Three days after they had left the Halls of Healing, Tyelkormo arranged a hunting trip with all of their brothers and sister-in-laws. Tyelpe and Elrond were invited as well, but disappeared into the woods not long after they set out.

Sarnayeldё glanced after them, frowning. “Be careful!” she called. Then she turned to Maglor. “Has it not occurred to you to worry about them? They could get hurt, and even if they don’t, they might cause all manner of mischief running off as they do.”

Maglor tilted his head, expression mild. No, it hadn’t occurred to him. “You needn’t judge my parenting,  _ verunésa.  _ Elrond is responsible, and even if he weren’t, he is  _ ceutawё,  _ a Healer. And besides, they are both intelligent and reasonable children. Neither will do something dangerous without first thinking it through.”

Sarnayeldё continued to frown. “Without thinking it through? I would prefer it if they didn’t do anything dangerous at all.”

“Well,” he grinned, “they are children.”

She hummed in response. “You’re different,” she informed him matter-of-factly after a moment. “More… princely.”

Maglor laughed easily. “I have always been a prince,  _ verunésa  _ dearest.”

“She’s right, though,” Nelyafinwё said, falling back from the lead so that his horse was in step with Maglor’s. Sarnayeldё moved forward to join Curufinwё. “You even hold yourself differently sometimes. You did it back in the infirmary when you were speaking to Elrond without even noticing it. Like you could be king if Indatar wasn’t.”

Maglor shifted uncomfortably, smile dropping from his lips. “It was necessary- before.” His voice broke, but the smile returned, dimmed though it was. “Maedhros taught me.”

“You’ve mentioned him before,” Nelyafinwё pointed out.

Maglor nodded. “He was a… a friend.”

“Was?” Nelyafinwё asked, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“He… isn’t around anymore.”

“Oh. I’m so sorry, I just-”

“It’s alright. It’s… it’s been a long time.” Then he smiled slightly, elbowing Nelyafinwё in the sid. “I think you would have liked him.”

“Oh?” Nelyafinwё asked, reaching to put his arm all the way around Maglor’s shoulders before deciding he was too far away and aborting the gesture.

“He was wonderful. He rearranged the politics of an entire continent from an infirmary bed, once. And he helped me raise Elrond and Elros, even though he didn’t want to at first.”

“Elros?”

Maglor winced. “Elrond’s twin brother.”

Nelyafinwё frowned.”Is he…”

Maglor shook his head, a bit surprised at how much it hurt, even though Elros’ death had been so many thousands of years ago. “He isn’t- no.”

“Oh, Laurё… I’m so,  _ so,  _ sorry for bringing it up.”

Maglor shook his head, wiping away tears, and managed a smile for his brother. “Don’t be. You were just curious. You had no way of knowing. And like I said, it was a long time ago. Eru knows I need to talk about it.”

“Well. I’m here to listen, if you need me. We all are.”

“I know. I know you are. And, believe me, I want to tell you everything, but I just  _ can’t. _ ”

Nelyafinwё looked hurt, but he did a good job of hiding it. “Will you ever?”

“I want to. I truly do. But not yet, and not all at once. I won’t be able to handle it right now. I’m still having trouble believing that I’m actually  _ here _ .”

“You’re settling back in well, I think, all things considered.”

“I am. You’re right. But it’s the safety part that I’m having trouble with. Where I was, where Elrond grew up… it wasn’t safe.  _ Nothing  _ was, not even allies. We had to be on our guard constantly, even in peacetime. It’s hard to translate that to being back in Aman.”

Nelyafinwё was about to reply, but Tyelko appeared beside them, looking exasperated. “Come on, you two, we don’t have all week, and I know those horses can go faster.” Then he grinned mischievously and spurred his horse into a gallop. Nelyafinwё glanced at Maglor. His concern was alleviated some when he saw the musician’s eyes light, and he joined their younger brother in his race.

* * *

It didn’t escape anyone’s notice that Elrond and Makalaurё acted strangely.

Elrond was a quiet, responsible child, acting far older than his scant years called for, and he often seemed fey, though no one mentioned this within earshot of either the boy or Makalaurё. He picked up on Quenya easily, but spoke only to Makalaurё and Tyelpe and rarely at that. When he sat down with Fёanáro and an architect to give his input on his rooms, Fёanáro was thoroughly shocked by how austere the boy’s tastes were. And again, when Elrond stood for the seamstresses to take his measurements and ask his preferences regarding color and fabric. He cooperated well enough, but there was disapproval in his eyes when he regarded the rich silks and velvets, and his lips turned downward for half a moment when one elleth held up a spool of gold thread and one of silver on either side of his head to decide which better suited his coloring.

Makalaurё was tight-lipped and secretive. He clung to his brothers and nephew as though they might disappear at any moment, but he avoided Fёanáro and the forge as much as he was able. Fёanáro didn’t push, but it cut a little deeper each time he entered a room only for Makalaurё to drop what he was doing and leave. Occasionally, when he wasn’t thinking, Makalaurё would fall back into the language he had spoken on that first day, and he always wore a glove over his left hand, even if the right was bare.

Both seemed far too used to scarcity. Makalaurё always finished his plate at meals, but never before glancing at Elrond as though to be sure the boy was getting enough. Elrond, in turn, kept concerned eyes on Makalaurё and refused to go anywhere until he had finished eating, as though Makalaurё might not eat at all if he didn’t. Fёanáro remembered seeing the older elves, the ones who could remember Cuivíenen, act similarly when he was very small, but never children so young as Elrond.

But it wasn’t until the day before they set out for Tirion that the family realized just how unfamiliar the two were.

* * *

Fёanáro was determined to fit in one more training session before they left. Makalaurё had yet to join in, though he and his son often watched whichever family members were sparring at the moment. Fёanáro had not thought to invite Elrond to join in, on account of the boy’s young age, though he supposed he should have expected it since Elrond had so quickly taken to joining Tyelpe in whatever he did, watching the older Elfling attentively and copying him to the best of his ability.

“Good!” Fёanáro called out, sheathing his blade while Morifinwё picked himself up off the dirt. The match had been close, but Fёanáro had won. Tyelpe took to the circle next, but before they could begin, Elrond stepped forward from where he stood next to Makalaurё.

“May I try?” he asked, turning round eyes on Fёanáro and tilting his head slightly, lips in a pout. Fёanáro knew that look intimately, having raised seven children of his own, but that didn’t make it any less effective. He glanced at Makalaurё in question and received an indulgent nod. The musician wore a complacent grin, though he tried to hide it behind his hand.

Fёanáro gestured to the weapons rack, brows lifting when Elrond immediately went for a pair of long twin knives. The Elfling tested their weight in his small hands, then nodded and joined Tyelpe in the circle. Makalaurё said something to him in the strange language they shared, grin not dropping. Fёanáro told Tyelpe to be careful of Elrond, though he wasn’t particularly worried. Telperinquar was far too fond of the boy to ever hurt him. Fёanáro stepped out of the circle and called for them to begin.

The fight was short. Elrond was far better than anyone had expected. He immediately took the offensive, using his size and speed to his advantage, though he was clearly pulling his blows, careful to never actually touch Telperinquar. Tyelpe was caught off guard as well, forced into a retreat. He blocked many of Elrond’s strikes, but they came so quickly that he was stuck on the defensive. Tyelpe’s blade dropped low for a moment to block a swipe aimed at his knee and that was all the opening Elrond needed. Too quickly for anyone to really see how it had happened, Tyelpe was lying in the dirt, sword flung several yards away and the tip of one of Elrond’s blades resting at the hollow of his throat.

The entire field was still. Makalaurё’s grin never left, even as his brothers turned wide eyes on both himself and Elrond. Technically, it had been a fair fight, though Elrond’s definition of a  _ fair fight  _ had possibly been warped due to growing up on the warfront.

“That was fantastic,” someone said at last.

Elrond looked genuinely surprised at the praise. Then he held out a hand to help Tyelpe up and placed the knives back on the rack with a shrug. “It wasn’t that good,” he said sheepishly. “I can’t even fight in a real battle yet. Just run messages and pick up arrows.”

“Keep them if you’d like,” Curufinwё said, gesturing to the knives. The Elfling lit up more than one so young should when being gifted with blades.

Fёanáro’s brows went higher. “Who taught you?” he asked, wondering who considered what he had just seen ‘not that good.’

Elrond beamed proudly. “Maedhros teaches us mostly, but Ada also, because he has both hands so we can know how to fight right handed opponents too.”

Nelyafinwё noted that Elrond spoke of this Maedhros in the present tense, as though he was still alive, which was a definite discrepancy with what Makalaurё had told him before. The rest of his brothers were more concerned with how casually the boy mentioned that Maedhros apparently had only one hand.

“We?” Tyelpe asked.

Elrond nodded. “My twin brother, Elros, and me.”

And with that, the matter was closed, though everyone was curious now to see Makalaurё fight. The next morning as they loaded up supplies, Fёanáro presented a set of simple dual swords to Makalaurё, who wondered if his father had been up all night making them or if they had already been lying around somewhere.

* * *

The trip to Tirion was long, though it passed quickly as they learned more and more about Elrond and Makalaurё. Everyone assisted the handful of servants and guards they had brought along to set up the camp each night and to take it down each morning. Makalaurё and Elrond often did much of the work based solely on the fact that they could put up and take down a tent in half the time it took anyone else, even Tyelkormo. Makalaurё drew his swords and walked the perimeter with a single-minded alertness at least twice each night: once after the camp was set and once before he went to sleep.

Several people attempted to convince him that it was unnecessary, but he dismissed them without fail. “We have set no watches and no defenses,” he said, as though there was any reason to worry when travelling this road.

He still refused to join in with training, but occasionally he would step in to correct someone’s technique. Tyelkormo especially was a victim of this: after the third time, Makalaurё had simply stood at the side of the field and called “Don’t be arrogant!” whenever the blond lost a spar.

Once, though, it was Fёanáro. He was sparring with a guard, just hand to hand combat, during the time between breakfast and breaking camp when it happened.

“You're standing wrong,” Makalaurë called suddenly from where he and Elrond watched. The boy was nodding along with Makalaurë's statement. “You'd be killed in a minute like that.”

He stood, his brothers watching with mild amusement. They expected him to correct the guard. Instead, to their surprise, he crossed to their father.

“Don't let me knock you over,” he instructed, his tone one of a battle hardened commander instead of the gentle, musical prince of the Noldor they knew. Then he grabbed their father's wrist and pulled quickly so his back was to his chest, and shoved the heel of his palm sharply against the space between Fёanáro’s shoulder blades, knocking their father to his knees.

“See?” Makalaurë said, “Your stance needs to be steadier.” Fëanáro pushed himself off the ground and a look of horrified realization crossed Makalaurë's face. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean-” he stopped and walked away, hands clenched tightly at his sides to stop their trembling.

* * *

The Ambarussa knew what Makalaurё had said regarding Elrond’s parentage, that the boy was half mortal, but they had visited grandfather Mahtan in Aulё’s forges often, and usually Maiar along with. And they had seen the way Elrond acted sometimes, staring at nothing with his head cocked to listen to nonexistent sound. He was at least part Maia, they would almost wager with Morifinwё on it. Almost.

They caught him, just once, in Makalaurё’s lap, cradling their brother’s left hand with his own smaller ones wreathed in healing golden light. Makalaurё had caught them staring and quickly pulled his glove back on, and the light had dissipated. But they had seen it. They knew they had.

* * *

Makalaurё didn’t sing nearly as often as he used to, and when he did, it was without thinking and heartbreakingly sad.

Elrond sang, though. His songs were happier. He hummed softly nearly all of the time, and it was impossible to ignore when the melodies were put to words. Even if those words were in an unfamiliar language. His music held the same power as Makalaurë's did, and when he sang or played, suspicions as to his identity faded. Of course he was Makalaurë's son. Who else could produce a child with such musical talent?

* * *

Both seemed to have some sort of disinclination toward promises.

“Tyelko, I swear-” Curufinwë was cut off there by a tiny hand over his mouth, though it was more the shock of the situation that silenced him.

“No oaths!” Makalaurë and Elrond said in stereo.

This became a pattern, though Makalaurë must have told Elrond off for covering Curvo’s mouth, because he refrained from touching after. If someone said “I swear,” or, “I promise,” or anything similar, either Makalaurë or Elrond, or both if they were both present, would cry, “No oaths!”

The family quickly learned not to promise anything, at least not in front of Makalaurë or Elrond and especially not if they weren’t completely sure that they could make good on it.

* * *

“Look! We’re nearly there!” Telperinquar poked Elrond’s shoulder and pointed to a spot in the distance. “You’ve never been to Tirion, have you? Don’t worry, you’ll like it there, you’ll get to meet all of our cousins and uncles and aunts and Indataron and Indammon. But she isn’t really our Indammon, because she married Indataron after Indatar was born.”

Elrond nodded thoughtfully and looked to where Tyelpe had pointed. “Like how-”

Suddenly, the boy went still and silent. The color drained from his face and his eyes glazed over. Tyelpe’s face scrunched up and he shook Elrond lightly, then yelped when his cousin started to sway.

_ “Ontarháno!” _

* * *

Everyone looked to Tyelpe at the panicked shout, but Maglor was the first to react. He dropped the conversation he’d been having with Herenyanel and ran back to where Tyelpe had halted.

“I have him,” he told a terrified looking Tyelpe, grabbing Elrond off the horse. It had been a long time since he’d been with Elrond when he had a vision, but he fell into the familiar motions with surprising ease.

He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, bouncing slightly. Elrond was too big to be rocked like this anymore, but Maglor decided to make an exception given the circumstances. A lullaby fell from his lips before he had a chance to worry about the words. It was the same one he’d always used, since they first found Elrond and Elros after Sirion.

When Elrond came out of it, he babbled softly about everything he had seen—thankfully in Sindarin. Maglor kept rocking and bouncing until he heard the word  _ Alqualondë _ , followed not two sentences later by  _ burning _ . He felt his blood turn cold.

_ Blood. So much blood. On his hands. In the water. He stood back to back with one of his cousins. He thought it was Finrod. Teleri were screaming. Noldor were cutting ships from the moorings. There was  _ **_so much blood._ **

It must have shown on his face, because the next thing he knew, someone was taking his shoulders and guiding him to the ground as someone else pulled Elrond away.

“It’s alright, Laurë, everything’s fine, nothing’s wrong.” That was Maedhros. Wait, no, Nelyafinwë. Maglor dragged himself out of the flashback, trembling as the adrenaline faded. He scanned the immediate area, searching for Elrond. Tyelpe had him. He had gone quiet, watching Maglor through exhausted, half-lidded eyes.

“Oh, little one, come here.” He gathered Elrond into his lap and held him tightly. “It’s going to be alright. We won’t let that happen. Any of it.”

Now all he had to do was make good on that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to have this out days ago but finals were kicking my ass. Though, to make up for it, this is the longest chapter yet at 3,506 words!
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> toron - brother
> 
> verunésa - sister-by-law (literally marriage sister)
> 
> ceutawё - healer
> 
> Indatar - grandfather
> 
> Indataron - great grandfather
> 
> Indammon - great grandmother
> 
> Ontarháno - uncle (literally parent brother)
> 
> Regarding the Ambarussa's deduction that Elrond is part Maia: I have a really long detailed explanation for how I think Maiar act very obviously different than other species, but it's faster to just direct you to Softly Sing The Children by Drag0nst0rm here on Ao3 because that's where I took the inspiration for my Maiar from.
> 
> Regarding Elrond's "Like how-" statement: I have no idea what he was going to say there. None. But I had to put something and it sounded as good as anything else I thought up.
> 
> This chapter is dedicated to my sisters for helping me to test methods of knocking people over. I wanted to add more and keep going with this chapter, but I was spiraling trying to figure out an ending and I have to move on with the plot or I'm gonna lose my mind.


	9. Chapter Eight

Their arrival in Tirion was greeted with much fanfare. A mounted guard escorted their group through the city to the palace courtyard. Finwë and Indis stood regally at the other side of the square, all of their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren arrayed behind them. Fëanáro dismounted and Finwë stepped forward to greet him.

“Glad as I am to see you, Fëanáro, your arrival is unexpected. What brings you to court after twelve long years of silence?” His tone was formal and wary, for he knew his eldest son well, but beneath it there was a gladness at seeing his child again after so long.

Fëanáro gestured flippantly. “Construction is being done on the house.” He was silent for a moment under Finwë’s sceptical gaze, then an excited smile lit his features. “That, and you have a fourth great grandchild and you simply must meet him.”

Finwë’s expression turned to one of happy surprise and he scanned Fëanáro’s household for the mentioned infant, frowning when he couldn’t find him. He looked back to Fëanáro in confusion.

“Who?”

Fëanáro offered no explanation. His sons and daughter-in-laws had dismounted by now as well, and with them Teperinquar and another Elfling who he didn’t recognise. But…

Finwë looked at Fëanáro in question. He nodded, eyes full of mischief. Finwë shook his head. “No. I would have met him by now. He must be at least twenty-four.”

“He’s nine, Atar, but that isn’t the important bit.”

Finwë looked at his eldest son incredulously. _Nine?!_ “Then what is?”

“He’s Makalaurë’s son.”

“Maka…” His voice faded and he looked back to the group with a new intensity, carefully noting each face and searching for that of the grandson he had believed to be lost. He couldn’t find Makalaurë until he approached the Elfling, leaning down to say something and then picking the boy up.

Finwë very nearly didn’t recognise him. He was… different, somehow, than he had been before, though he couldn’t be sure as to how. Fëanáro caught Makalaurë’s eye and waved him over.

Makalaurë smiled shyly at Finwë, adjusting the half-asleep Elfling on his hip. “Indatar. It’s been a long time.” He shifted, seeming almost nervous.

Finwë smiled back, hoping to set his grandson at ease. “I’ve missed you. We all have. But are you going to be introducing me to my _indyon_?” His tone was teasing and playful, but Makalaurë startled slightly anyway.

“Oh! Of course! I’m sorry, it’s been a while since I’ve had to do anything even remotely diplomatic; aside from that, the last few hours have been… not good.” His smile turned slightly strained at that, but he recovered quickly and shook the child to wakefulness, saying something to the boy in a language Finwë didn’t know. He didn’t bother to set the Elfling on his feet.

“I am called Elrond…” there was a moment of hesitation where the boy’s face scrunched up in confusion, then he started again, “Elrond Perquendë.” This statement was punctuated by a firm nod.

Finwë was utterly baffled by the surname the boy had given—half elf?—but smiled brightly in response. “Elrond, hmm? That does not sound quite Noldorin—or Vanyarin!” Finwë chortled cheerfully. The boy shook his head, giggling slightly at Finwë’s overemphasis, but didn’t speak. “Well, in any case, I am Finwë, High King of the Noldor, and your great grandfather.”

Elrond looked about to contest this statement, but yawned instead, curling closer to Makalaurë, who looked to Finwë with some uncertainty. “Indatar, as pleasant as it would be to stand here and catch up with everyone, I can’t hold him like this forever. Is there somewhere I could put him to sleep?”

Finwë looked like someone had rather rudely given him a piece of unexpected information. “Oh, dear, I had no idea you all were coming, I haven’t prepared any rooms…” Makalaurë bit his bottom lip, shifting from one foot to the other anxiously. “Oh, but don’t worry, I’m sure we can find something! If nothing else, we could move a child’s bed into your rooms for the moment. And after he’s settled, I think I speak for everyone when I say that I’d love to know where you’ve been if you don’t mind telling us about it.”

* * *

They did end up moving a second bed into Maglor’s rooms, then everyone demanded that he go with them to the family room and tell them about where he’d been. He sat on one of the many couches next to Nelyafinwë, looking from one face to another and trying to match names to the ones he didn’t recognise.

He startled just a bit when Findekáno spoke from Nelyo’s other side. “Makalaurë? Is everything alright?”

“Of course! I just… I don’t recognise everyone.” He got progressively quieter as he explained, then frowned, trying to ignore the wash of guilt at not recognising members of his own family.

Findekáno and Nelyafinwë both looked at him then.

“Come on now, you haven’t been away all that long. There’re only a few new faces from last time you saw us all.”

Nelyo shook his head at Findekáno’s incredulous expression. “He couldn’t remember the way to his own bedroom the other day,” he said, trying not to sound pitying.

Maglor’s eyes flicked to the floor.

Findekáno, ever cheerful, only faltered for a moment. “That’s alright, we have to introduce you to some people anyway. I’m sure no one will mind a few extra introductions. And you can always ask someone, if you need help remembering things.” And then, before Maglor could stop him, “Indatar?”

Finwë broke off his conversation with Indis to look at Findekáno. “What is it, _pitya min_?”

“Can we do introductions now? Makalaurë doesn’t recognise everyone.”

Finwë’s expression was one of concern as he glanced to Maglor, but he nodded. “Is there anyone in particular you can’t remember, Makalaurë?”

Maglor glanced around the room again, pointing out to Findekáno those people who needed to be introduced. Findekáno nodded.

“Well, we can start with baby Artaresto, since you won’t have met him yet,” he said, looking expectantly at a blond on the other side of the room who was cradling a tiny baby in his arms. Maglor knew him to be Angrod—Angaráto right now.

Angaráto looked unsure about reintroducing himself to his cousin. “Um, I’m Angaráto, my wife Eldalótë,” he indicated a woman sitting in a chair a few feet away, “and our son, Artaresto. He’s only a few months old,” he finished awkwardly. Maglor nodded. He’d never known Orodreth well in Beleriand and he’d always gotten on better with Finrod than Angrod, but he wanted things to go better this time around. That meant there had to be less infighting.

Findekáno looked to Turukáno next. He sat next to Elenwë, who held a sleeping golden child. Idril, Maglor knew, though he couldn’t for the life of him remember her Quenya name. Turukáno smiled gently. “You already know myself and Elenwë, of course, but Itarillë was just born before you disappeared, so I suppose we should introduce you to her.”

“She’s beautiful,” Maglor said earnestly.

Lastly, Findekáno looked to their Aunt Findis. “ _Ontanésa_ , could you introduce your husband and son?”

Findis looked surprised. She and Fëanáro had never been fond of one another, by virtue of her being the first child of Indis and Finwë’s marriage, and for the most part, that animosity had carried over to their children. But she complied, because Makalaurë was her nephew and she did care about his well being.

“My husband, Maltainimŏ, and our son, Laurefindil.”

 _Oh._ Laurefindil. Glorfindel. No wonder he had looked so familiar. Maglor smiled at him. “I’m sure we’ve already met, cousin, but I can’t remember it. I hope we will get along well this time around.”

It didn’t escape anyone’s notice that he had called Laurefindil ‘cousin,’ but then that had been his intention. If he intended to fix this family, it would be easier to start where there wasn’t enmity, and Maglor didn’t think Laurefindil could hold a grudge if he tried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maltainimŏ - I like the headcanon where Glorfindel is Findis' son, and I decided that since everyone is happy in Aman right now, a second parent was necessary. He loves his wife and son very much. He's a Vanyarin smith who followed Nolofinwë to Middle-earth, but died crossing the Helcaraxë. Maltainimŏ means 'blessed gold.'
> 
> Quenya Translations
> 
> Indatar - grandfather
> 
> indyon - great grandchild
> 
> pitya min - little one
> 
> Ontanésa - aunt (literally parent sister)
> 
> Regarding baby Orodreth: I subscribe to the version of canon where Orodreth is Angrod's son instead of Finarfin's.
> 
> Regarding Finwë's behavior: Finwë is very good at children. He must be, since he has five of his own and a ton of grandkids and inlaws and great grandkids.
> 
> Regarding Fëanor's "fourth great grandchild" statement: Idril had to have been born in Aman since Elenwë died on the Helcaraxë, and I headcanon Tyelpe as older than Idril. So in my verse, Idril, Tyelpe, and Orodreth were the only ones of Finwë's great grandchildren born in Aman. But they all think Elrond is Maglor's son, thus "fourth great grandchild." And of course, Fëanor would be incredibly proud that his line is the first to give Finwë two great grandchildren.
> 
> Regarding Elvish aging: Turgon mentions that Idril was born right after Maglor disappeared, i.e. twelve years ago, meaning that she's the Elvish equivalent of about four.
> 
> Regarding Maglor's behavior: He hasn't seen any of these people in literal millennia. He's not going to remember the ones who weren't important to the histories. And, you know, the more people are around, the more likely it is that someone will notice it when he or Elrond slip up, so of course he's nervous.
> 
> Regarding the name Elrond gives: Elrond is young, but he isn't stupid. He knows giving a Sindarin surname or saying Eärendilion won't turn out well. Perquendë is (roughly) the Quenya for Half-Elven, and thus a good compromise. (At this point in his life, Elrond was not yet known as Peredhel, but he does remember more than he strictly should of his first go round.)
> 
> Coming up within the next few chapters: Maglor plots, Elrond puts his Maia blood to good use, Finarfin and Finwë get played, the extended family have a realization, and Nerdanel enters the scene.
> 
> This chapter is mostly filler, but there were OCs that needed introduction and plot points that needed setting up. (And you have no idea how much I wanted to make this Russingon, but that would have distracted from the focus.)


	10. Chapter Nine

Maglor quickly realized that he was in a uniquely advantageous position: no one in the family wanted to upset him. Even Arakáno and Aikanáro, who had always disliked Maglor and his brothers, hesitated when Maglor became agitated. And as much as he hated to manipulate them, he would have to be a fool to waste any opportunity to make his family get along.

It wasn’t difficult. In fact, it became almost routine as the days passed in a haze of balmy high summer: in the afternoon, Maglor would find two people who didn’t get along and insist that they both accompany him for a stroll in the private gardens, then, just as they started to fight, play at being panicked or upset. Inevitably, they dropped whatever argument they’d been having to calm him.

Maglor’s manipulation tactic worked far better than he had expected or hoped. He even came across Findis and Fëanáro talking in a mostly-unused corridor one morning. Amiably. As though Fëanáro had never slandered Indis to Findis’ face. He hadn’t yet dared to try it with Nolofinwë and Fëanáro yet, and he was nowhere near stupid enough to try it on Indis and Fëanáro without backup, but thus far it seemed promising.

There were still fights, of course. Many of which Maglor broke up, especially those between Nolofinwë and Fëanáro and any others that got physical. He dragged Artanis and Irissë off of Turukáno and Findaráto at breakfast six days after his arrival in Tirion, catching a stray blow to the cheek in the process. All four combatants were utterly horrified and the fight immediately devolved into a shouting match over who had hit him. That, Maglor decided, was enough. He was not some porcelain statuette to be protected at every turn.

_ “Quildë!” _ He yelled over them, pouring some of his magic into the word. All eyes were on him, though Irissë, Artanis, Findaráto, and Turukáno continued to hiss accusations at one another. His voice quietened some, but lost none of its power.

“Be quiet, all of you! I don’t know which of you hit me, and frankly I don’t care. One punch is hardly going to make me fall apart. There are more important matters right now. Do you  _ know _ how many fights I’ve had to break up since we got to Tirion? Anyone?” He looked at them expectantly, part of his mind noticing that he had taken the same tone and posture as he had so many years ago, reprimanding his riders in the Gap. No one answered his question.

“Eleven. Eleven fights. I’ve been here  _ six days _ . We’re supposed to be a family.” He met the eyes of each of his brothers and cousins in turn, ending with his father and Nolofinwë. “I’m disappointed in all of you. Elrond was better behaved when he was six. You’re all grown  _ nér  _ and  _ nís _ , and I’m holding you to the standards of a child.” He was silent for a moment, then shook his head and walked out, muttering something rude under his breath as the door swung shut behind him.

* * *

Everyone stared after Makalaurë for several minutes, surprised by his sudden outburst. Nelyafinwë was the first to speak. “What was that?”

Elrond, having returned to his breakfast after Makalaurë had gone, piped up with an answer. “Ada doesn’t like it when his family fight with each other. He says he’s lost enough people already and the ones he has left should fight the Enemy, not each other.” This second sentence was said as though he’d heard it many times, and judging by his manner and the way Makalaurë had just acted, he had.

There was another moment of silence, then, “Eleven?” Findekáno asked incredulously. “That’s two fist fights a day that he’s broken up since he’s been here.”

“That is a lot of fights,” Arafinwë agreed.

Írimë spoke hesitantly. “Perhaps… what if we all make an effort to disagree less… well, maybe not less, but perhaps less violently?”

Nolofinwë nodded his agreement. “That’s a good idea,  _ pia nésa _ .”

Finwë looked to his eldest son apprehensively. “Fëanáro,  _ ionya _ , would you be amenable to this idea?”

Fëanáro nodded, seeming more subdued than usual. “I just want my son back,” he said softly, thinking of how Makalaurë was so adamantly avoiding him now that there were enough rooms and people that they rarely had to see each other.

* * *

Findaráto hesitated outside his cousin’s bedroom door. Makalaurë was right. The way everyone had been acting was utterly ridiculous, and he wanted to apologise, though he didn’t relish getting shouted at again. He shook his head. Makalaurë didn’t shout at people unless they deserved it. He would be fine. He knocked.

“Come in,” his cousin called softly.

Findaráto slipped through the door, standing uncomfortably in the middle of the room. Finally, he spoke. “About breakfast-”

Makalaurë interrupted. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have shouted at you all. I just- I’m tired of all the fighting.”

Something in his eyes told Findaráto that his cousin didn’t just mean the familial disagreements. Findaráto sighed. Nelyafinwë and Findekáno had always been better at the emotional part of being a big brother than he was. He sat on the bed next to Makalaurë anyway, opening his arms in invitation. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Makalaurë let out a choked sound and flung himself into his cousin’s arms, finally allowing himself to break. “ _ Yes _ . It doesn’t even have to be about everything that’s happened, I just want to  _ talk _ . Finno, it’s been  _ so long _ since I’ve had an actual conversation with another living person.”

Findaráto was surprised by his much older cousin’s admission, but took it in stride. “I’m always willing to talk. All of us are, except maybe Artanis.” His sister had been nothing but prickly toward Makalaurë since their initial reunion, though he had no idea why.

“I  _ know  _ that, I just…” Makalaurë shook his head, and his next sentence sounded utterly despondent. “Never mind. It’s not like I can even really tell you the truth about anything that happened anyway.”

Findaráto frowned, deciding that it might be best to change the subject a bit. “You know, it’s been twelve years since we’ve played any music together. Indatar has a room full of instruments just gathering dust, waiting for someone to play them.”

Makalaurë laughed self-deprecatingly, and Findaráto’s worry mounted. “It’s not as though I can even play most of them any more. Look,” he said, and pulled off his glove with a pained hiss.

Findaráto couldn’t hold back a gasp. Makalaurë’s left palm was terribly burned, the puckered skin shades of shiny red and yellow. He tore his eyes away to meet Makalaurë’s. “What happened?” he breathed, some of his horror slipping into his tone as he resisted the urge to touch the scars.

“I touched something I shouldn’t have.” Makalaurë’s lips quirked in a humorless smile. “You have no idea how hard it is to take care of yourself with only one functional hand. I probably would have died a long time ago if I hadn’t lived with Maedhros. It was easier for him than it ever was for me, of course. Another of my many failings.”

Findaráto looked at his cousin, eyes wide. “Don’t talk like that! You’re perfect the way you are, and we’d all be devastated if you died. Who ever made you think you aren’t worth all of Arda?”

Another awful laugh. “But I’m  _ not _ , Finno. You don’t know what I did. I’m a terrible person. You’d agree with me if you knew. Two whole  _ continents _ agree with me. But you don’t. You  _ can’t _ ; I can’t  _ tell _ you anything.”

Findaráto felt that he was missing a crucial part of the conversation, but nonetheless pushed on. “Of course you can. You can tell me what you did that makes you think you’re a terrible person. Or tell Nelyo or Findekáno or your father or Indatar or my father or  _ Ontarháno _ . Any of us. We’re your family, and I know we act like children sometimes, but you can tell us anything.” He caught Makalaurë’s right hand in both of his, trying to impress upon his cousin the utter sincerity in what he’d just said. “We care about you so much, Makalaurë. We’re here.”

Makalaurë cast a strange look in his direction, pity mixed with… something else. Then he stood, sighed, and pulled his glove back on, shaking his head. “How can you be? What I’ve been through—Quenya doesn’t even have a word for it yet. You’ve never needed one. How can you be there for me if you don’t even have a word for half the things I’ve lived through?” And with that, he left, leaving Findaráto to think on everything he had said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Six thousand years of trauma finally catch up with Maglor and he loses his cool. Poor Finrod.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Quildë! - Silence!
> 
> nér - male elf
> 
> nís - female elf
> 
> pia nésa - little sister
> 
> ionya - my son
> 
> Ontarháno - uncle
> 
> Quenya Names (some of these are obvious, but for the ones that aren't):
> 
> Arakáno - Argon
> 
> Aikanáro - Aegnor
> 
> Artanis - Galadriel
> 
> Irissë - Aredhel
> 
> Írimë - Lalwen
> 
> Regarding Maglor's bit of emotional manipulation: He'd hate himself for it, but he would manipulate his family to Angband and back so long as it was for their own good. And considering the fact that none of them have any idea what happened while he was gone, just that he seems more fragile now, no one would want to trigger a bad memeory.
> 
> Regarding Artanis being "nothing but prickly" toward Maglor: Galadriel can sense something wrong about Maglor, she just doesn't know what... Yet.
> 
> Regarding Maglor's statement that Quenya doesn't have word for half of what he's been through: Before the Flight of the Noldor, would Quenya really even need words for things like war and torture? And if you don't need a word, then it isn't going to exist.


	11. Chapter Ten

Itarillë and Elrond were fast friends. She trailed after him wherever he went for a few days, from the library to the training field, and he took her under his wing like a little sister, disregarding the fact that she was technically the elder of the pair. Tyelpe was hesitant at first to accept her into their little group, but Elrond won him over easily enough and the three quickly became a staple around the palace, Tyelpe and Itarillë making all manner of mischief while Elrond kept a lookout for anyone who might try to stop them.

At night, Maglor worked on explaining the situation to Elrond. Elrond took everything rather well, all things considered. There were fewer tears than Maglor had expected before Elrond began helping him piece together the histories, everything that needed to happen. These discussions were invariably in Sindarin, to avoid incident should anyone walk in on them. Maglor found it slightly strange, hearing plans for all manner of espionage and manipulation and, occasionally, flat out warfare, come from the mouth of a child.

Bits and pieces of memory had begun to return to Elrond, though they seemed random, spanning from Lindon to Imladris in no particular order. He had re-adopted the method of conduct he’d favored in Gil-galad’s court, somewhere between the crassness of a soldier and the honeyed words of the nobility. It was nearer to soldier than nobility, though, which meant that Maglor—and anyone else listening—got somewhat of a shock each time he opened his mouth.

It was inevitable, he supposed, that Losgar and Alqualondë came up. It was afternoon, an hour or so before dinner would be served. Itarillë was visiting with the daughter of some minor noblewoman and Telperinquar was helping his father in the forge, which left Elrond with nothing to do. Exploring the city had long since lost its novelty and he still couldn’t read Quenya very well, rendering the library nearly useless, so he was walking in the garden with Maglor.

“Ada?” He asked suddenly. “About our plans…”

“Did we miss something?”

Elrond sent him a flat look, which which was somewhat hindered in its effect due to the fact that he was at most four feet tall right now. “Yes. Something very important.”

Maglor frowned in confusion. “What is it?”

“The ships, Ada.”

Maglor’s shoulders drooped and he sighed. “Ah. I’d forgotten. I suppose we’ll have to arrange for enough ships to transport the Noldorin hosts to Middle-earth when the time comes.”

Elrond looked at him again. “Ada, neither of us has any political power here. Being in line for the throne doesn’t matter when no one ever dies.”

“You’re right.  _ We _ don’t have any power. But we know people who do.”

“Such as? Ada, I mean no offense, but who in your family has political power and enough sense and tact not to insult the Teleri to their faces in negotiations?”

Maglor choked out a surprised laugh. He hadn’t heard Elrond say anything like that since he’d been Gil-galad’s herald. “Well, as for tact, that’s always been Nelyo’s department, but for negotiating with King Olwë, I’d pick _Odhron’anar_ Finarfin without a second thought.”

Elrond nodded thoughtfully. “He is in a good position for it.”

“He is,” Maglor agreed. “But more importantly, he could get Indatar to open the royal coffers enough to pay for a fleet of Teleri ships, and seeing as the only other option is to build them ourselves, that is a necessary skill.”

Elrond looked appropriately horrified when Maglor suggested building the ships themselves. “ _Odhron’anaroth_ Finarfin it is, then. I wouldn’t set foot on a Noldor built ship if Sauron himself had a knife to my back.”

Maglor choked on air. He would never, ever get used to Elrond speaking like that while looking so young. When he recovered he said, “Well, I suppose we’d best start convincing him to help us. I’ll set up a meeting as soon as possible.”

* * *

‘As soon as possible’ turned out to be late the next morning. Maglor had begged two sets of gems and beads off of Morifinwë last night and now stood behind Elrond, braiding one of them meticulously into the boy’s hair. He tied off the last of the braids and finished it with a silver circlet, standing Elrond up and moving him to the wall mirror to examine to overall effect. They made a stunning picture, Maglor in deep blue robes offset with silver embroidery and pearls and diamonds in his dark hair and Elrond in white with blue embroidery, hair braided with sapphires and azurite. For the first time in a long time, he was glad of his father’s insistence that they dress to impress.

After a moment, Elrond frowned. “Why go to all of this trouble for a meeting with your uncle, Ada?”

Maglor smiled serenely and adjusted Elrond’s circlet. “Well, as Maedhros liked to say, half of diplomacy is how you look. And it’s going to be difficult enough to get what we want from Odhron’anar in the first place, so I decided that it would be best to look very nice.”

Elrond nodded his understanding and schooled his expression into the one of relaxed serenity that he’d perfected during his time as the Lord of Imladris and Maglor did his best to do the same.

“We’d best be on our way now,” he said. “We don’t want to be late.”

* * *

About halfway to Arafinwë’s study, Tyelkormo and Irissë stopped them in the hall. Tyelkormo looked them over, brows raising in surprise.

“Where are you two going that requires such formality?” Irrisë asked with no small amount of suspicion.

“To see  _ Ontarháno _ Arafinwë. There’s something we want and he’s the best person to get it for us.” Maglor said.

“And what would that be?” Tyelkormo cut in.

Elrond smiled up at him cryptically. “Boats. Teleri swan ships, to be exact.”

At that, both Irissë and Tyelkormo looked in equal measure baffled and alarmed.

“Why would you  _ want  _ Teleri ships?” Irissë asked.

Tyelkormo seemed to have some sort of realization, eyes widening and hands flailing about as he searched for words. “Elrond is a Seer! That incident on the road here, it was a vision! And after, he said something about Alqualondë. Whatever you’re doing must have something to do with whatever he Saw.”

“Well,” Maglor managed after a moment. He hadn’t expected anyone to put that together quite so easily.

Tyelkormo grinned. “I’m right.” It wasn’t a question.

“You are,” Maglor conceded after another long moment. “But if you do not let us pass soon, we’re going to be late,” he warned, “and this is an extremely important meeting.”

“Alright, alright,  _ but _ … how important is it?” Irissë asked eagerly.

“The fate of Arda rests on our ability to procure a fleet of ships,” Maglor said dryly and walked away.

“Really?!”

“No, I think he was being sarcastic.”

“Were you being serious, Makalaurë?!”

“Makalaurë!”

Maglor grinned privately, ignoring the insistent calls of Irissë and Tyelkormo behind him. It wasn’t  _ quite  _ that important, but nearly enough. He wanted to stop and lead them along, but he was on a tight schedule this morning.

* * *

They arrived at Arafinwë’s study and knocked softly. A servant opened the door and they entered, Elrond carefully in step just behind and to the right of Maglor. Every move was deliberate, just as Maedhros had taught him during long ago negotiations with Azaghâl and his people. Arafinwë looked up, then did a double take when he saw how they were dressed.

“May I assume that this is important, then?” he asked.

Maglor inclined his head slightly, lips quirking in a secretive smile. “You may, my lord.”

If Arafinwë was surprised at the formality, he didn’t show it. He gestured the the chairs before his desk. “Sit.”

They did. Arafinwë regarded them curiously for a moment, then, “Would you like to tell me what this is all about?”

“Aside from being significantly more tactful than much of our family, you have connections to the Teleri. That could be useful in our current endeavor.”  _ Never show all your cards at once. Make them curious. _

Arafinwë took that in, expression turning thoughtful. “‘Our current endeavor?’”

Elrond took that question. They had practiced for this well into the wee hours of the morning. “Atar and myself, my lord. We need Teleri ships, as many as possible with regard to time constraints.”

“I will not use my marital connections to acquire ships for an unspecified venture.”

Maglor remembered what Maedhros had taught him.  _ The negotiation doesn’t start until they say no. _

“As you know, my lord, some few Eldar are blessed with the gift of Foresight. You yourself are among them, as well as your daughter.”

Arafinwë nodded cautiously. “We are. But I know of a scarce few others. Do you?”

Maglor didn’t smile, but he wanted to. They had caught Arafinwë off guard and they were prepared for this line of questioning. “My lord, my son has made some of the most accurate predictions of the future that I’ve ever seen, even more so than your daughter’s. If he says that something is going to happen, I find that it is best to believe him and prepare yourself.” He poured the power he was named for into every word, reveling in the feel of Arda’s magic bending to his will.

Elrond took up the role of speaker before Arafinwë had a chance to, working the same magics by virtue of his Maia blood. “My lord, I have seen what will happen for many years to come. Here and now, we have a chance to prevent innumerable deaths and the sundering both of our family and our people. We ask a small price given the magnitude of your contribution.”

Unprepared for it as he was, Arafinwë’s eyes were beginning to go hazy under the onslaught of power. “What will happen?” He asked the question with some difficulty, struggling against the spells taking hold in his mind.

Elrond’s voice took on a smooth cadence, compelling Arafinwë to listen as the Music flowed and bent to a child’s wishes. “Your half-brother will craft the greatest treasure to ever grace all the lands of Arda, but he will pour his fëa into the work. He will become selfish and prideful and care more for his gems than his family. The Vala Melkor walks already the path of Darkness, and he will wish to take Fëanáro’s treasures for himself. He has followers that the Valar do not see. He will kill the Trees and your father and flee with Fëanáro’s gems and Fëanáro will pursue. Your siblings, your children, your nieces and nephews, all will shed the blood of your kinsmen and be laid to Doom by Námo. Fëanáro’s work will cause tragedy indescribable and you have a chance to stop it. You need only to help us.”

Arafinwë nodded, though under his own power or that of Elrond’s spells, Maglor wasn’t sure. “I will help. What can I do?”

Maglor let himself smile now. They had won.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had so much fun writing this chapter. I live for these sorts of scenes.
> 
> Sindarin Translations:
> 
> Odhron’anar - Uncle
> 
> Odhron’anaroth - Great Uncle
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Indatar - Grandfather
> 
> Ontarháno - Uncle
> 
> Atar - Father
> 
> Regarding Maglor and Elrond's use of Sindarin: They don't want anyone to pick up on what's really going on. A good way to make sure of that is to use a language no one else speaks.
> 
> Regarding the negotiation: I have negotiated many things. It's something you plan and practice and dress up for. Having two people who can work literal magic just by speaking would help too. And as a subset of that:
> 
> Regarding Elrond's Maia blood: Maia are lesser Ainur. They can work the very fabric of the universe. Elrond certainly can't do that, but he can make some pretty powerful magic. For something a bit more in-depth, I'll direct you to Softly Sing The Children by Drag0nst0rm here on Ao3.


	12. Chapter Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maglor was married in canon. I've set it up to allow for a romance between Maglor and (my version of) his canon wife if anyone is interested in that. So maybe let me know whether you'd like that or you're vehemently opposed to the idea of a romance in this story?

It was a matter of minutes to convince Finwë that helping them was in his best interests. They sent the letter to Olwë that evening.

* * *

Maglor watched fondly as Itarillë and Elrond darted down Market Street from one stall to the next, harrying the vendors with shrill questions. He followed at a more sedate pace, content to keep the children within his sight. A sense of foreboding flooded over him when they stopped at a wooden stall labeled in messy red Tengwar. “Exotic Pets.” Three Vanyarin  _ nér  _ stood behind the high table, showing off their wares to the children. Itarillë stood on tiptoe to see over the table, and even from the distance Maglor could see the glee on both children's faces.

Maglor closed his eyes for a moment. “Oh, Valar, please…” He walked quickly toward the stall, intent on reprimanding someone. Whether that someone was the children or the shopkeepers, he wasn’t sure.

Elrond and Itarillë turned to him as one, eyes bright and hopeful and both pairs of hands close together. “Can we buy it, Ada?  _ Please? _ ” Elrond begged.

Maglor was instantly wary. Responsible as Elrond was, he still made a fair amount of trouble. Especially around Itarillë. “What  _ is _ it?”

In answer, Itarillë removed her hands from over Elrond’s, then put them back quick as a flash of lightning. “A lizard!” she crowed brightly.

“A lizard.” Utterly deadpan, Maglor looked to one of the shopkeepers. “What  _ kind  _ of lizard?”

The  _ nér  _ grinned and launched into a pre-rehearsed speech, hands moving dramatically and his voice dropped and rose. “A lizard from the great deserts, south past Valinor to where only the Lord Oromë and ourselves—” here he gestured to himself and his fellows “—dare to walk.”

“Ooh!” Elrond and Itarillë were captivated. Maglor was not.

“All very exciting, but what  _ is  _ it.” He was well used to dealing with Tyelkormo’s propensity for bringing home strange wild animals.

Apparently, the trader knew when to drop the showmanship. Good. “It’s a very docile sort, good for children. Hardly venomous at all and it can survive just about anything you throw at it. Very loyal, too, an excellent companion animal.”

“Venomous,” Maglor parroted.

“Barely,” the trader protested defensively. “It won’t bite its master, and anyone it does bite will feel just an itch.”

“See, Ada, it’s harmless!” Elrond cried. “We should buy it.”

Itarillë nodded her eager agreement. “We should,  _ Ontarháno. _ ”

Maglor sighed. He had lost; he was just delaying the inevitable. “Show me.”

The children beamed and dumped the tiny, squishy creature into his palm. It was long and brown and spiked and it was hanging upside down from the back of his hand. It was by far the strangest thing Elrond had ever tried to bring home. A thought occurred to him. “Which of you will keep it when Elrond and I leave Tirion again?” he asked Itarillë.

The children frowned and leaned together, whispering furiously. Then they turned back to him, eyes bright and smiles wider than ever.  _ Oh no.  _ “We’ll buy two of them.” It wasn’t a question.

Maglor sighed heavily and pinched the bridge of his nose. Oh, Turukáno was going to string him up from the gates for this. “Very well.”

The children cheered.

* * *

They were headed back to the palace, each child carrying a lizard in a glass box with vents in the top and earth and plants in the bottom. Itarillë had taken the brown one and Elrond had chosen a grey so that they could tell the animals apart.

“What shall you call them?” Maglor asked.

Itarillë scrunched her brow in concentration, then lit up. “Milyerumë!”

“A very fitting name,” Maglor assured the Elfling.

Elrond looked up at him, eyes wide. “Caereth?” Ah. A Sindarin name.

“An excellent name for a companion,” Maglor said, and Elrond beamed.

Which distracted Maglor just enough to collide head on with the  _ nís  _ who had stopped at a jewelry stall in front of them. Both elves hit the ground hard, but the woman hit harder. The contents of her basket scattered over the street and sections of red hair came loose from the precarious updo over a familiar freckled, laugh-lined face-

Maglor, halfway to standing, fell back to the ground, meeting round warm-grey eyes. He spoke first, in a choked whisper.

“Ammë?”

* * *

Everyone had noticed something off about Makalaurë and Elrond. They weren’t sure, just yet, what that was. Arafinwë frowned, glancing at his nieces and nephews from his spot on a couch in the family room, Artanis and Findaráto curled up to either side of him. Atar had decided that there needed to be a  _ discussion  _ that included the entire family, though given Makalaurë’s conspicuous absence, he had and idea what the discussion was going to be about.

Írimë entered last and pulled the door quietly shut behind her. Finwë stood, frown firmly in place. Sighed, and spoke. “I know that we’ve all noticed that something is…  _ different  _ about Makalaurë recently. And Elrond… I adore him. He is my family. But he is not a normal Elfling.”

Then Tyelkormo spoke. “I’m not sure about Makalaurë,” he began honestly, “but Elrond is a Seer. Both of them said so.”

Irissë nodded. “They did. I was there.”

“That isn’t terribly strange in this family, though. Several of us are gifted with Foresight,” Findaráto said.

Telufinwë added his piece next. “He’s a Healer, too, the kind with spells and magic. I’ve seen it.”

“Makalaurë said he’s also half mortal, if that’s true,” Morifinwë said.

Arafinwë shook his head. “I don’t think so. He did something to me, when we were negotiating—I can’t remember what he said, and if I think about it too hard the world starts to spin.” He shuddered slightly, remembering the feel of being under someone else’s control. “It was terrifying. I don’t think- He isn’t mortal; he’s at least part Maia. I’m sure of it.”

“What were you negotiating?”

“They—Elrond and Makalaurë—they wanted Teleri ships.”

“Why?” Fëanáro asked.

Arafinwë shrugged.

“I’m not sure,” Finwë answered, “but we sent a letter off to King Olwë three nights ago.”

Findis looked at her father strangely. “How did they convince you, Atto?”

“It… seemed like a good idea…” he trailed off. “Do you think that whatever they did to Arafinwë…” He didn’t need to finish. The question hung in the air for a moment.

“Well, we certainly didn’t get our stubbornness from Ammë,” Írimë said wryly.

“I knew there was something strange about them. They feel… wrong,” Artanis said.

“How so?”

“Well, Elrond is just kind of un-Elfin. But Makalaurë feels like…” She huffed, frustrated. “Oh, I don’t know how to explain it- dangerous? I’m not sure. But they’re hiding something.”

Findaráto nodded agreement with his sister’s statement. “Makalaurë told me that he’d done bad things, but he refused to tell me what he thinks is so terrible. He said he couldn’t. But his hand…” Findaráto shivered. “I can’t even begin to imagine how much that must have hurt.”

Nelyafinwë pounced. “He showed you?”

Findaráto nodded.

“How bad is it?” his cousin asked somewhat hesitantly.

“It’s- a burn. It’s like a scar, but not completely healed. It pains him still, even though it looks old.” He met Nelyo’s eyes, his own wide. “It’s bad, Nelyo. But he won’t  _ talk _ to anyone.”

“They’re keeping secrets. We need to do something to help him, but we can’t if he won’t tell us anything.”

Morifinwë frowned thoughtfully. "He might not have to tell us anything..."

Curufinwë huffed out a sigh. "Explain, toron. Now."

"They borrowed my hair ornaments."

"Yes? And? We all know that you have the best ornaments out of all of us, excepting Indatar."

"When I went to get them back, I heard Makalaurë and Elrond talking. Elrond was upset over something. Makalaurë said-" Morifinwë searched days-old memory for the exact wording his brother had used. "He said, 'Elrond. What you did was necessary. That does not make it right, but I have claimed you as my own. I will  _always_ care for you, regardless of what circumstance may require of you.' I wasn't meant to hear that," he admitted.

"So... Elrond isn't really Makalaurë's son at all?"

* * *

“Makalaurë,” Neranel breathed, staring blankly at her son.

There was a moment of utter stillness before he threw himself into her arms, just carefully enough to make sure neither of them hit the street again. She clung to him fiercely, not daring to let him go for fear of him disappearing again.

“I missed you so much,  ionya . So much.”

It was a few moments later that Nerdanel became aware of the two children standing a few feet away, faces in an identical expression of surprise. She didn’t recognise either of them, though the girl, perhaps twelve years old, looked familiar. She stood, brushing dirt off her pants, and extended a hand to Makalaurë to help him up. He still looked slightly dumbstruck.

“ _ Ammë _ . I-” he shook his head, grabbing at her hand like he did as a child so as not to be lost.

“I have you,  ionya _. _ I promise. I promise, I won’t leave.” Because there was something fundamentally  _ wrong  _ with Makalaurë’s fëa. She could feel it. And if he’d been returned for as long as Aulë had suggested, someone else should have felt it by now and dragged him to a Healer whether he wanted it or not. And now that she was there, she would do her best to see it righted, but first, she had to see about the children.

“ Ionya _.  _ As wonderful as it is to see you again, you were childless and unmarried when you disappeared. Now I return to find two Elflings trailing after you and no wife in sight?” She said it with a smile, teasing instead of scolding. She could feel the marriage bond on his fëa as well, after all, buried deep though it was.

Makalaurë flushed to the tips of his ears, mouth flopping open and shut like a fish dragged onto land. As soon as he recovered from the shock, he was quick to negate the potential implications of her statement. “I most certainly  _ am  _ married! You can’t-” he huffed out a breath, apparently thinking better of whatever he had been about to say.

Though, Nerdanel was left curious. She tried prodding it out of his mind subtly, patient as she may be working with a poor cut of marble. Shields of adamant slammed up, blocking her out as surely as the Teleri’s boats were watertight; it left her reeling and she was certain she had never taught him  _ that _ .

“I would very much appreciate if you refrained from doing that,” Makalaurë said, voice fragile but edged with a coldness she’d never heard from anyone before. It was sheer willpower that kept her from flinching at the tone. The tension drained from Makalaurë all at once, shoulders slumping. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean-” he sucked in a breath over his teeth and shook his head, eyes finding a cobble in the street and not moving even as he pointed at the golden-haired girl standing off to the side, half hidden behind the older boy. “Ammë, this is Itarillë, Turukáno’s daughter.” He looked up, just a bit, when he gestured at the boy. “And this is Elrond. I claim him as my son.”

Nerdanel frowned slightly. Married, but childless and with wife nowhere to be found, and claiming a strange Elfling who fëa-deep  _ did not belong here _ as kin. Trouble of this magnitude had always been for Tyelkormo and the Ambarussa to get tangled up in, up until the minute she’d left for Aulë’s halls nine years ago. Never,  _ ever _ , had Makalaurë done something quite so shocking. Not before.

_ What  _ have _ you been getting up to, little one? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been so long since I updated this! I meant to do this sooner, but I've been traveling and I'm writing two things for the TRSB19, so this kind of got pushed to the backburner, but I'm glad to get back to it.
> 
> Sindarin Translations:
> 
> Caereth - earth climber
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> nér - male elf
> 
> Ontarháno - Uncle
> 
> Milyerumë - soft desert
> 
> nís - female elf
> 
> fëa - soul
> 
> Regarding the lizards: Elrond is still a child, no matter how much he might not act like it. And he finally does get to act like it. Anyway, if you aren't sure how to picture the lizards, I was going for some sort of cross between a horned toad and a gecko.


	13. Chapter Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feanor is flustered and very in love with his wife. Nerdanel thinks it's adorable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter includes a fade to black sort of thing at the end because I cannot and will not write a s*x scene, but it is definitely implied. A massive thank you to @senalishia on Tumblr for helping me out with this chapter!

Elrond and Itarillë chattered easily to one another as their group continued the walk back to the palace, and Nerdanel kept half an ear on their conversation out of habit as she subtly pried for any scrap of information from Makalaurë. Only, Makalaurë was apparently far better at subtlety than she was. She asked once more after his wife, and he changed the subject so adeptly that she didn’t even realize what had happened until she was knee deep in explaining the merits and drawbacks of various types of stone for outdoor sculptures, and by then they were arriving at the palace gates and her chance to call him on it was gone.

When they reached the palace proper, Elrond and Itarillë ran off and Makalaurë followed to keep them out of trouble, leaving Nerdanel alone with her thoughts. Her mind drifted as she walked, finding her too-long neglected marriage bond.

Fëanáro had never been good at ósanwë, a fact which had irritated him to no end, but she was. When their marriage was still new, she would say sweet or dirty things in her husband’s mind just to watch him flush. Now, she used it to find him in the vast expanse of rooms. Nerdanel wasn’t surprised, when she arrived at her father-in-law's closed study door, to hear yelling from inside.

She opened the door, deciding to take pity on whichever of her siblings-in-law was being shouted at this time. Nolofinwë, standing on the side of the desk opposite the door, noticed her first, a smug look coming over his face. Fëanáro tended to have trouble arguing when she was in the room. Nelyo followed his uncle’s eyes, his own lighting up with a delighted smile. Fëanáro turned around last, and promptly choked on his argument.

His face softened and he moved toward her half in a daze, breathing her name like a prayer, hardly noticing as Nelyo and Nolo slipped out of the room.

“Fëanáro, melenya…” Nerdanel caught him up in a tight embrace and Fëanáro dragged them down onto the rug, ever impatient, kissing her hard on the mouth.

“Your father’s office floor, meles?” she couldn’t help asking, rolling them so that her hair brushed Feanaro’s cheeks. Her husband just stared up at her adoringly, not bothering to answer. He stayed that way for several minutes, until she laughed and asked him what he was looking at.

“You,” he said dreamily. “I was counting your freckles.”

“I see. Well,” she caught his hands in hers, tossing his gloves to the side, and pressed a feather-light kiss to each finger tip, “perhaps I shall count the scars you’ve given yourself in the forge. Or perhaps you still know how to unlace a corset.”

Fëanáro flushed red to the tips of his ears, laughing breathlessly as his fingers fumbled with the strings. “Valar, I’d forgotten how much I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so glad to finally get back to this story! This chapter is short, but I really like it. Nerdanel and Feanor are so fun to write, but also really difficult...
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> melenya - my love
> 
> meles - love
> 
> Unnecessary note: I hc Nerdanel as the taller of the two and wrote with that it mind here, so if the physical positioning seems weird, that's probably why.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The inspiration for this story is just coming back all at once, huh? So, most of my chapters do not require any sort of warnings, but this chapter contains a brief, non graphic description of murder in the italicised paragraph near the end.

Maglor knew he couldn’t evade his family’s questions indefinitely. He just hadn’t expected to be cornered under the premise of a garden party. Sarnayeldë appeared in his doorway just before noon, insisting that he dress up a bit before they went.

“Why?”

“Verindatar has decided to have a celebration—the whole family is all together for the first time in twelve years. You are required to attend.” Sarnayeldë said.

* * *

The garden was decorated with carved tea candles and strings of paper ornaments. Even Fëanáro had been convinced to dress up a bit, though if the dopey smile was any indication, ammë had likely chosen his outfit. Nelyo looked up  when Maglor entered the little area where the party was being held and waved him over with an easy smile. He and Findekáno were discussing some bit of gossip the latter had heard in town.

“What do you think, Laurë?”

“About what?”

“Ah,” Findekáno laughed, “now that is quite the question. Well, I heard from a painter in the upper town that his fiancée, one of King Ingwë’s clerks, told him that one of Indammë Indis’ Vanyarin noble ladies is coming to visit soon. Apparently, her husband has run off to join up with a Teleri ship crew headed to,” his voice dropped to a dramatic stage whisper, “ _Beleriand_.”

“Really?”

Nelyo nodded, picking up the story easily. “And that’s not all! They have children together, and he’s leaving anyway. Can you imagine leaving your wife alone to raise three children so that you can run off to a distant continent you’ve never seen with people you’ve never met?”

“It sounds kind of like Eӓrendil and Elwing,” Maglor said, without thinking about it.

“What?” Findekáno’s question was entirely innocent. Maglor knew that.  But it didn’t stop the immediate regret that welled up inside him.

_I should have thought._

“They were… people I knew. Before,” he lied.

“In… not Aman?” Nelyo asked, voice soft.

Maglor nodded. “Elwing and their sons were… things were happening. Eӓrendil sailed to find Valinor, but then he never returned. Elwing went a bit mad. The servants mostly raised her sons, for four years. Then Elwing… disappeared. Went away. Maybe she died, I don’t know. Maedhros and I adopted her sons.” It wasn’t all true, but nearly enough.

“Elrond?”

Maglor nodded again. “Can we talk about something else, please?”

“Of course!” Findekáno said. “What about… Maedhros? Who is that?”

Maglor shook his head vehemently. “Something else.”

Nelyo looked thoughtful for a moment, then, “Well, you’re married, right? Who is your wife?”

Maglor smiled softly. “Her name is Elenéþa.”

“That’s a Telerin name.”

“I know.”

“How’d you meet?” Findekáno asked.

“She pushed me into the water and she wasn’t even sorry.”

“Who pushed you into the water?” asked Anairë, having heard their conversation as she walked by.

“My wife, the first time I met her. She pushed me into the water and she told me to screw off and she wasn’t sorry and I fell in love with her anyway.”

“Oh, that sounds sweet! What is she like?”

“Honest. Very blunt. She’s a pearl diver, but she helps weave the nets, too. She seems mean, but she really isn’t. And she always wanted a daughter, but we never had one.”

“Will we ever meet her?” Nelyo asked.

Maglor was struck with the realization that, in this time, his wife would still be alive. He could find her again. They could have the daughter she’d always wanted. She didn’t have to die this time.

* * *

_He cut through the Teleri crowd, motions rough and unpracticed. He had never killed before. A flash of silver hair here, of aquamarine fabric there, going red under his blades. The atrocities were committed under cover of darkness, too dark to know if someone was on your side even though they were wearing the other colors. One of his knives through a nér’s belly and_ move on, he isn’t getting up  _. He turned and his knives hit solid flesh and Elenéþa’s face was one of such utter betrayal. He wasn’t sure which of them screamed, and then Nelyo was dragging him onto one of the ships and_ she’s gone, I killed her, it’s my fault _fell from his lips, sounding in his mind like an endless condemnation, and no one else was screaming, why weren’t they as horrified as he was-_

* * *

“Laurë!” Fëanáro was shaking him, shouting his name, and the rest of the family were ringed around them, eyes crinkled in worry. He grabbed at his father’s wrist in acknowledgement, mind spinning too fast to speak.

“Makalaurë? Are you alright?” Ammë asked, brushing fallen strands of hair from his face.

He shook his head, slowly and then faster, and they both moved to hold him close, murmuring soothing words in each ear. And Maglor clung to his parents and wept for hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another short chapter I guess. It was going to be longer, but the rest of what was going to be in this chapter seemed too lighthearted to follow this.
> 
> Elenéþa: Teleri woman who was not, at first, as smitten with Maglor as he was with her. Means "Sister of Stars" in Telerin. Was the thorn necessary? Not at all.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Verindatar - grandfather-in-law
> 
> ammë - affectionate form of mother
> 
> Indammë - grandmother


	15. Chapter Fourteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the last super short chapter, I swear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The events of this chapter take place roughly at the same time as the events of Chapter One, but instead of being in a Finwean forest, we are in a Teleri village about two weeks south of Alqualonde.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Meet Elenéþa.

Elenéþa sat on the end of the dock and dangled her feet in the water, listening to the lapping of the waves and the soft music coming barely audible from a larger city a few miles down the coast. Occasionally, she muttered choice words under her breath as she had to go back a loop or two on the net she was mending.

_ Pick up, round the back, hitch. _

The motion was repetitive, and that made it easy to get lost in thought, which, in turn, made it easy to mess up. Mending was not, strictly speaking, her job, and she had insisted, vehemently and for several hours, that it had been an accident and so she wasn’t technically at fault; she’d tipped back off the boat and the net had caught between her toes and torn on a knife someone had left out. But since she’d ultimately been the one to make the hole, her brother had insisted that she be the one to fix it.

Elenéþa sighed explosively when she reached the end of the hole, tossing her shuttle to the side and flopping back onto the ever damp wood of the dock. Distant Telperion bathed everything in a cool silver-blue light, and if she closed her eyes, she could almost imagine herself close enough to see the Trees themselves in all their glory. A gust of wind brought with it the damp salt smell of the sea and a wave splashed over her bare legs and stomach, and she was drawn out of the vision. Surely a city so near the Trees as to see them in person could not smell of the sea she loved so fondly.

Another sigh and she sat up, gathering the net to put away before she joined her father and brother for supper. Her mother was away for several months, captaining a passenger ship to Beleriand, and as much as Elenéþa missed her, she was proud to be the daughter of someone so accomplished. After all, not just anyone was brave enough to leave the safety and comfort of Aman for the wilds of Beleriand.

Elenéþa stood in the entryway and towled herself dry enough that she wouldn’t drip on the furniture, then wandered toward the kitchen. Her brother was sitting alone at the table working by lantern light on a proposal gift for the girl he was seeing. Their father must have already retired for the night.

“Did you finish?” her brother asked, twisting in his chair to grab a plate from the counter and set it in front of her.

“Of  _ course  _ not! In fact, I’ve actually made three  _ more _ holes that I’ll have to sit for  _ hours _ to mend!” she replied scathingly. She was bone-deep exhausted from a week of back-to-back dives and she just wanted to eat and fall into bed until she was needed again. Neither of those required anyone to speak to her.

Her brother muttered something rude and she shot him a glare before deciding that it wasn’t worth it and starting to shovel food into her mouth. She finished her meal quickly and stood to go to bed.

As she did, something seemed to snap violently into place somewhere deep within her fëa, quick as a dart. She grabbed at the back of her chair to steady herself as her vision went out, barely registering the clatter and pain of it and herself hitting the floor, followed by two sets of footsteps—it must have woken her father—and her brother worriedly calling her name. The rest of her awareness drained away then, and she knew no more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO. It turns out that I actually have a ton of headcanons for the Teleri. But I won't subject you to them here.
> 
> Regarding Elenéþa's mother's job: I think the Teleri had to have had at least a little bit of contact with Beleriand. After all, a lot of them did leave family east of the sea.
> 
> Regarding the ending: When elves get married, they bond in mind, body, and soul. Except that that bond requires two people to work. Elenéþa definitely got the short straw in this situation, since she is now married to someone she's not even met yet.


	16. Chapter Fifteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Russingon write themselves, but you don't actually have to read it as shippy if you don't want to.

“Makalaurë?”

Maglor turned around at the sound of Findaráto’s voice. Things had been tense between them lately; his cousin hadn’t sought him out often since their encounter the week before. Maglor wondered what had changed.

“What is it?” he asked, not unkindly.

Findaráto looked uncomfortable anyway. “Ah, well, Findekáno said, that is, we all heard, yesterday…”

Oh. Maglor nodded encouragingly, even if he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear whatever came next. His breakdown yesterday afternoon had become the talk of the palace, though Indatar and Indammë were doing their best to quell the rumors that were starting up among nobles and servants alike.

Findaráto tried again. “You said that your wife is Teleri, correct?”

Maglor nodded. “She is.”

“Well, Ammë is going to visit family in Alqualondë soon, while Atar closes negotiations for a fleet of ships. We’re going as well, of course, and I thought, perhaps, you'd like to come along with us and see her? I asked already if you could, and you wouldn’t be intruding, I’m bringing Amarië after all and she isn’t even family yet-”

Maglor smiled softly, catching Findaráto’s wrist and cutting him off. “I think I’d like that very much.”

In truth, he wasn’t sure what he’d do if he met with Elenéþa, but some part of him dearly wanted to. They couldn’t be the same as they had the first time around. He knew that. But it couldn’t stop him hoping.

* * *

Nelyafinwë frowned, holding the child up to his eye level. “What am I supposed to do with you?”

Elrond wrinkled his nose and shrugged. Makalaurë had left the Elfling in his care while he went to visit with his wife, and Nelyo wasn’t entirely pleased with that.

“And I thought I was done playing nanny,” he said, meeting the child’s eyes before sighing and placing him on the ground. “Your father just runs off to see his wife and doesn’t even take you along. Don’t you want to see her as well?”

Elrond shook his head, looking utterly unaffected. “I’ve never even met her.”

“You haven’t?”

“Ada doesn’t talk about her, either,” he said, as though that piece of information was entirely unremarkable. Then: “This is boring.”

Nelyafinwë took a moment to sigh, then smiled and said, “Well, I’m sure we can find something around here for you to do. It really hasn’t been so long since there was last a child living in the palace. Is there anything you like?”

“What about the library?”

Of course. The boy’s Quenya had been improving in leaps and bounds, and he’d demonstrated a fair knowledge of tengwar; it was only a matter of time before he started reading. And it was something for him to do as well. “I think we can manage that.”

* * *

“What’s this word?”

Nelyafinwë leaned over Elrond’s book, glancing at the word the Elfling pointed at. “Cardialgia.” He turned back to his own book, then stopped and grabbed the book away from the child. “What are you reading!”

“Academic literature,” the boy replied, grabbing for the book.

Nelyo stood, holding it above his head. “You are far too young to be reading this kind of thing!”

“I’m too young to be on a battlefield,” Elrond countered, “but I’ve done that plenty of times. Give me my book!” He jumped, grabbing at Nelyo’s arm and clinging like a limpet.

“No. You’re a child. What would your father say if he found out that I let you read medical journals?”

“He’d be proud that I was taking the initiative to advance my skills in Healing,” the boy said shortly. “Now I want my book back.”

“No.”

“Yes!”

“No!”

_ “Yes!” _

_ “No!” _

_ “Yes!” _

“Nelyo?”

Nelyafinwë turned quickly to face the owner of the voice. Elrond shrieked and held on tighter to his arm so as not to fall. Findekáno had come from deeper in the library and was leaning on a bookshelf trying not to laugh.

“Please tell me you aren’t arguing with a nine-year-old,” he said lightly, closing the few feet between them to loop his arm through Nelyo’s.

“He is!” Elrond accused, still hanging from Nelyafinwë’s other arm and looking pleadingly at Findekáno. “He won’t give back my book.”

“Nelyo…” Findekáno tilted his head up, the fondness in his eyes lessening the effect of his insistent expression.

“Finno,” he replied firmly. “He wants to read medical journals. What is Makalaurë going to say when he comes back?”

Finno raised his brows and looked at Elrond. “Well?”

“Ada will be proud of me for learning to read better and learning more about Healing.”

“It sounds like you should give him his book back, Nelyo.”

Nelyafinwë looked between them both, his cousin and his nephew giving him nearly identical puppy dog eyes, and sighed. “Both of you? ...Fine. You win. Have your book. Finno, if Makalaurë is angry with me, I’m blaming you.”

“Of course,” his cousin said easily.

* * *

* * *

Maglor recognised most of the people he passed walking down the streets of Alqualondë, some from classes he’d taken or taught at the music school but others from a hectic, night-dark battlefield. He wished there was someone there who he could look to for support, wished he hadn’t been so short with Findaráto and Amarië that morning, wished he hadn’t run off alone in a city he’d had trouble remembering the layout of at the best of times. But he had, and now he was paying the price.

He rounded a strangely sharp corner that he was only somewhat sure led back toward his lodgings—the Teleri, for all their good points, were not architects—and stopped dead. Well. He hadn’t found what he was looking for. But Dagor Dagorath and the Second Music could come and go and he would still recognise Elenéþa’s laugh.

He scanned the street he had ended up on—a market of some sort. Elenéþa was behind a stall with her brother, laughing at whatever the customer had said. Maglor closed his eyes and breathed deeply for a moment, then approached.

Elenéþa’s brother greeted him. “How can I help-”

“You!” Elenéþa had turned around and caught sight of him, brows furrowed and tone something between wonder and anger.

Her brother looked between them. “Who are you?” he asked Maglor warily, putting a protective arm around his sister’s shoulders.

“I think we need to have a conversation…” Maglor said hesitantly.

Elenéþa nodded. “I think we do.”

* * *

Elenéþa’s father had quickly seen the marriage bond for what it was, though he had no explanation for how it existed. She spent days in her room trying to figure out who was on the other end. All other approaches to her husband’s—what an odd thought—mind were tightly shielded, but the marriage bond seemed neglected. Any thoughts that came near enough filtered down the bond to Elenéþa, and he didn’t seem to notice her, or if he did, he wasn’t choosing what she saw, leaving her baffled at the glimpses she caught. Some thoughts were in Quenya, while others were in a language almost identical to what the people in Beleriand spoke. Others were just images, mostly of three Elflings making mischief or a various many people who all looked similar enough to be family.

Once, she saw the Princess Eӓrwen and her husband Prince Arafinwë and had momentarily wondered if her husband was perhaps a prince of the Noldor before dismissing that thought as ridiculous. But by far her favorite of her husband’s thoughts were snatches of song, heartbreakingly sad but entrancingly beautiful.

It was nearly a month and a half after the bond had formed that she and her brother made their semi-annual trip to Alqualondë for market. She laughed at a customer’s joke, then when the woman left, turned around to check the status of their wares, and when she looked back up, a Noldorin elf was standing at their stall, looking unreasonably nervous.

Though perhaps his nervousness was justified, since she met his eyes and suddenly something around her marriage bond seemed to scream. This was her husband…

“You!” Perhaps not the most eloquent of introductions, but it would have to do.

Her brother frowned deeply, looking between her and the stranger, then pulling her closer and asking warningly, “Who are you?”

The stranger who was her husband looked sad, terrified, and elated in turns. “I think we need to have a conversation…”

Well, that was the understatement of the century. Elenéþa nodded firmly, shrugged off her brother’s arm, and stood to her full, quite impressive, height. “I think we do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this in two sittings and am very happy about how it turned out.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Indatar - Grandfather
> 
> Indammë - Grandmother
> 
> Ammë - Mother
> 
> Atar - Father
> 
> Regarding the dynamic between Elrond and Nelyafinwë: No matter how much of Middle-earth Elrond remembers, he's stuck with the body and, to some extent, emotions of a child. He doesn't know how to feel about Nelyo. He kind of looks and acts like Maedhros, but he isn't yet, so Elrond is being somewhat difficult on purpose. Nelyo sees this tiny child and wants to mother hen him, but he acts so much like an adult that he just can't. So he treats him like he would a pissy teenager.


	17. Chapter Sixteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A long overdue explanation and a horrifying revelation.

“Perhaps we should talk somewhere less public?”

Elenéþa nodded in agreement. “Are you staying nearby?”

Her husband shook his head with a sheepish smile. “I have no idea. I’m entirely lost.”

“Right. Of course you are,” she huffed softly, though she wasn’t particularly annoyed. Noldor were notoriously bad at mapping Teleri cities. “We can go to my room at the inn. It’s a bit far away, but a far sight more private than the Square.”

Her brother shook his head firmly. “Elenéþa, if you think I’m leaving you alone with a stranger-”

“My husband,” she challenged.

“You never married him! You’re perfect strangers!”

She turned back to her stranger. “Well? What’s your name and are you going to try to molest me if we go off alone together?”

He choked on air and turned an interesting shade of red. “No! I mean- Valar, why would I do something like that? You’re my wife; I want you to like me.”

Elenéþa shot her brother a triumphant look. “And your name is?”

“Makalaurë. Kanafinwë Makalaurë.”

“I’m Elenéþa. Let’s go.” With that, she looped her arm through his and dragged him off before her brother had another chance to protest.

* * *

Valar, he’d forgotten how  _ forward  _ she was. Maglor laughed giddily to himself as his wife—his wife!—dragged him though the streets, pushing her way through with a tight hold on his wrist when the crowds became too thick. They reached a small inn and she paused to exchange a few words with the woman at the bar before leading him two floors up and unlocking a somewhat shaky door.

Elenéþa threw herself down on the bed and Maglor sat cross-legged at her feet.

“So,” she said, fingers twisting through the loop of her low bun in quiet contentment.

“So,” he agreed.

“Why are we married?”

He groaned and dropped his head back against the bed frame, meeting sea green eyes for an instant before looking away. “You’re going to think I’m insane no matter how I try to explain it,” he warned.

“Maybe,” she conceded, “but the Noldor are generally regarded to be greater authorities on the Valar than we Teleri. Perhaps you know something I don’t.”

“I know many things you don’t.” Oh, Eru, that came out wrong. “Sorry! I mean, of course you know about things I’ve probably never even heard of, but-” he broke off and hid his face in his hands. This wasn’t how this conversation was supposed to go at all.

Elenéþa laughed and sat up halfway to pull on the blue enamel butterfly that held all his braids together at the back of his head. “What things?”

She was forgiving, too, he remembered. “Well- No, this is ridiculous.” He huffed and turned round to face her. “If I say something completely off-the-wall insane, do you promise to at least try to keep an open mind?”

* * *

Now she was curious. What could this Makalaurë possibly have to say that required that preamble? “Alright.”

“I’m eight thousand years old.”

“No. Try again. No one is eight thousand years old.” Of all the people the Valar could have picked for her, he had to be a liar. Well, she wasn’t falling for his dishonesty.

“It’s true. I’m eight thousand years old and I spent six thousand of them in Middle-earth and Beleriand.”

Elenéþa sat up fully, folding her legs in the blankets and placing her hands firmly on her hips. “Nobody is eight thousand years old,” she repeated. He was blatantly lying to her, wasn’t even trying to come up with something believable. She was offended.

“Melkor went to the far south of Aman and found a giant spider called Ungoliant; she ate the light of the Two Trees and the Noldor fled to Beleriand under Doom by Námo. Six thousand years later, I was dying, bleeding out in my foster son’s infirmary ten days before he was supposed to sail to his family in Valinor. And then I woke up on my grandfather’s lands outside Tirion.”

Why would he seek her out just to tell tall tales? She… didn’t think he had. His tale was vague, but at the same time too detailed to be entirely made up. “Say I believe you for even a second. Why are you telling me this?”

“You’re my wife. I have to tell someone, and you seem like the best person to tell,” he said, expression wide-eyed and openly trusting. Trusting that she wouldn’t drag him to a mind healer or simply send him away. She sighed in frustration. Well, now she  _ had  _ to believe him.

* * *

“Tell me everything.” Elenéþa’s face was one of annoyance, but her eyes were alight with curiosity.

Maglor drew his knees up to his chest and looped his arms around them, simply breathing for a few moments before he began his tale. “In 1449, my father created three gems, the Silmarils. They held the light of the Two Trees, though no one ever found out how he did it. The gems and Melkor’s influence drew him to madness. He believed that his half-brother wished to take the throne and reacted violently. Our family was exiled to Formenos, and my grandfather renounced the kingship and went with us.”

Elenéþa sat forward slightly, enthralled. Maglor paused at the thoughtful look on her face, allowing her to marshall her questions.

“Your grandfather is the king? King Finwë?”

Maglor nodded.

“Then I suppose that makes you a prince? You aren’t of Princess Eӓrwen’s brood, or I would have heard of you before. And… you do not look particularly Vanyarin.”

Maglor laughed, Elenéþa’s mere presence putting him at ease. “Perceptive. My father is Fëanáro and my mother is Nerdanel. I have six brothers, two sister-in-laws, a nephew, and a son who is mine in all but blood. I suppose you’ll be wanting to meet them eventually?”

“I will. But, perhaps you should continue your story for now.”

A shaky, nearly inaudible sigh, and he closed his eyes, voice taking on a too-familiar cadence to mask the hurt that came with the rest of the tale. “The Valar called my father to a festival in Valimar. Melkor was south of Valinor in Avathar. My father went alone and unadorned, leaving even the Silmarils behind. Melkor sent Ungoliant to swallow the light of the Trees while he travelled to Formenos to steal the gems. He killed my grandfather and stole away to his fortress Angband with the jewels.”

Elenéþa made a sound of sympathy in the back of her throat, moving to place a hand on his shoulder in a silent gesture of ‘I’m here.’ He placed his hand over hers, squeezing lightly.

“Yavanna begged my father give up the Silmarils to revive the Trees. He refused. When he heard that they had been stolen, he flew into a rage and called the Noldor to him that we may travel to Beleriand and retrieve the Silmarils. King Olwë… Olwë refused to give us ships. So my father took them by force of arms. He… I... We all killed many Teleri that night. Námo laid Doom upon us should we proceed. Arafinwë and his host turned back. My father’s host sailed with the false promise to send the ships back for Nolofinwë’s people.”

Maglor couldn’t bear to turn around and look at his wife’s face. She must be horrified, appalled to have offered comfort to one who killed her people. “You… Do you know what my fate was?” she asked, the tremor in her voice entirely out of character.

* * *

Elenéþa didn’t know what to think about that revelation, but her husband, this not-so-stranger, had pulled his knees tight to his chest, eyes teary and voice horribly small. She slid to the floor, pressing close to his side and putting an arm around his shoulders in silent comfort as he told her of her fate in this time that hadn’t happened yet.

“You fell to my blade. It was an accident, in the dark, I didn’t mean… but I  _ hurt  _ you. I hurt you after I swore I would never…”

A part of her was utterly disgusted. Why was she sitting on the floor offering comfort to her killer? But he wasn’t. He was just her husband. He never had to hurt her this time around. “You haven’t hurt me,” she said before she could think about it anymore. “You don’t ever have to hurt me. You won’t.”

“I won’t,” he agreed, swiping futilely at his tears. “I’ll teach you how to fight, to protect yourself, and then if you never want to see me again, I’ll understand.”

“Continue your tale, and we shall see.” In the privacy of her mind, Elenéþa could admit that she’d already decided to stay, but it was not something to be said aloud. Her husband seemed to understand this and cast her a grateful look before continuing, voice stronger now.

“When we got to Beleriand, we burned the boats so that Nolofinwë and his people would go home. But instead they marched across the Helcaraxë. My oldest brother was kidnapped by Melkor after my father was killed. When our cousin arrived off the ice, he was rescued, but lost his right hand. He built a fortress near Angband and gave over the High Kingship to our uncle, though, really, he was still the one running things.”

He cracked a small smile at this, and Elenéþa couldn’t help but smile herself.

“For a while, I defended the territory around Himring, my brother’s fortress. Then a dragon, a dark creature of Melkor, destroyed it. Many of my people were killed, but the ones who survived took up residence in Himring. Much happened then, battles and kings passed and I took the name Maglor, and then there was word that Dior, the grandson of King Elwë, possessed a Silmaril. We attacked his city, sacked it and killed him, but his youngest child, a daughter, fled with the gem. Three of my brothers were killed and Dior’s twin sons were never found.

“Dior’s daughter wed Eӓrendil the Mariner and they had twin sons. When the boys were six years old, we attacked their city. Eӓrendil had sailed four years past to find help from the Valar and Elwing, his wife, jumped from a tower and was turned to a bird by Ulmo when we cornered her. My youngest two brothers were killed in the battle. We found Elwing’s sons and took them in. We raised them as our own until they were grown, then the elder of the two chose to live a mortal life, while the younger chose immortality.”

Elenéþa listened in silence, her hold on Makalaurë’s shoulders tightening each time his expression turned sad. He went quiet for a long moment, breath carefully measured as he held tight to her hand. When she was sure he would speak no more, he continued, voice steady but heartbreakingly gentle.

* * *

Maglor went quiet after telling Elenéþa of Elrond and Elros, not allowing his breathing to speed up the way it so wanted to. His fingers felt numb with panic, and he couldn’t make himself let go of her hand even a little. Eru, did she hate him? He’d told her so many of his awful deeds; if she just walked away and never returned, it would be a mercy. He deserved all the punishment she could give and more. But she wasn’t. She wasn’t shouting or hitting or even walking away. She was simply sitting, her body pressed against his, arm tight around his shoulders and hand slack in his. When he dared to glance over, her expression was soft, caring.

He didn’t deserve her.

Maglor took up the tale once more, wanting to at the very least give her an ending. “The Valar themselves came to Beleriand then, and took back the Silmarils from Melkor. My remaining brother convinced me to help him steal them back.We were successful, but the evil we had done was too great. The Silmarils burned our fëa when we touched them. My brother threw himself and his Silmaril to death by fire and I cast mine to the sea, vowing to sing my repentance until the end of days.”

Elenéþa gave a small, “Oh.” She pressed closer until there wasn’t even a hair’s breadth space between them, blinking back tears of her own. He gathered his breath to finish the tale.

“For five thousand years, I did. I wandered the beaches even as Beleriand sank and Númenor rose and fell again. Then I was ambushed and fatally wounded. I travelled to my son’s city in the hope that he could heal me. I don’t know what happened after that. The next thing I can remember is waking up on my grandfather’s lands with my son, Elrond with me, returned to just nine years old.”

* * *

Elenéþa thought for a long several minutes, then said, “And now you're here.”

“And now I am here,” Her husband, the stranger, Maglor agreed. “I work to stop much bloodshed. I would be honored to have your help in this endeavor, if you would give it.”

Suddenly, something that he had said at the very beginning rang in her mind. “1449?”

“Yes.”

“That's this year. The year ends in mere weeks; it cannot be long before your father crafts the gems you spoke of.”

* * *

Oh. Maglor felt his blood go cold. That was not good. His mind whirled, replaying all the horrors caused by his father’s greatest invention. He couldn’t breathe. Elenéþa was shaking him, thumping him on the back and when that didn’t work holding him to her chest and breathing deep and even, movements gentle even as they were frantic.

“Ple- ou ha- en to- eath- Maglor!”

That got through to him at last. It had been so long since he’d heard his Sindarin name from a mouth other than his own, decades or centuries or perhaps millennia, and it forced him to take heed of her words, her requests for him to try to match her breathing. He tried. Failing was better than not breathing at all.

After several minutes, Elenéþa relaxed her hold on him and they both leaned back against the bed, thoroughly exhausted. “Better?” she asked.

“A bit. Tired.”

His wife stood and pulled him to his feet as well, taking a bit of his weight when his legs were too shaky to hold him up fully. She stripped him of his jacket, belt, and boots and toed off her own shoes, then drew the curtain against Laurelin’s light and guided him to the small bed, held close in his arms so that they both would fit.

He drifted off, the world becoming distant as sleep claimed him. Close as she was, Maglor could feel Elenéþa’s heartbeat and her warm breath, growing even in sleep, against his collar bone. She smelled pleasantly of salt and wind, and Maglor let that thought carry him away from nightmares as Irmo took them both.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is the second longest overall at nearly 2,500 words, and I wrote it in just two sittings. Can you believe it? I am amazingly happy with how this turned out and the more I write   
> Elenéþa, the more I love her.


	18. Chapter Seventeen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elenéþa's brother gets a name and angst occurs.

When Órehanna came back from market in the late evening, his sister’s room was quiet. She was in there with the man who had caused her so much trouble for the past month and a half, and she wasn’t yelling or throwing things at him. Órehanna was, naturally, worried.

He cracked open the door just a little to check up on them, a smile crossing his face against his will at the sight that met him. His sister was curled close to her husband, eyes glazed in sleep. Her husband—Makalaurë?—slept with eyes shut in either exhaustion or injury, but the way they held tight to each other was sweet nonetheless.

Had he really been worried? Of course they had come to an understanding. Elenéþa may be a spitfire, but she had a heart as big as the sea when it mattered the most. Órehanna closed the door with a soft click and headed toward his own room. His sister could handle herself, but he was glad she wouldn’t have to.

* * *

Nelyafinwë woke in the near darkness of Telperion’s glow. He wasn’t sure what had woken him until a series of soft noises came from the smaller bed on the other side of the room.

Oh. Elrond. Nelyo had taken to sleeping in Makalaurë’s rooms since his brother had left to better keep an eye on the child, but there had yet to be any incident.

He sat up, moving slowly so as not to startle the boy, and lit a candle, then crossed to Elrond’s bed. He thought it a credit to his bravery that he didn’t flinch when Elrond backed against the wall and drew a knife on him. Nelyo sat on the edge of the bed, candle flickering just bright enough for him to see the tear tracks on the Elfling’s face. Elrond slowly lowered the knife.

“Elrond,” Nelyafinwë murmured soothingly, “are you alright?”

Elrond placed the knife on the bedside table, watchful eyes on Nelyo. He shook his head mutely, drawing he knes up to his chest, and Nelyo was suddenly struck by how small he was.

“Do you want to talk?”

Elrond was still for a long moment, then shrugged.

Nelyo tilted his head and opened his arms, and Elrond crawled closer, sniffling and rubbing his sleeve over his face. Nelyafinwë hummed a tune that his father had taught him long ago, rocking gently back and forth as the candle burned down and Elrond’s hiccuping cries died with it.

Finally Elrond spoke against his shoulder, in a voice so soft it could almost have been just the wind. “I had a nightmare.”

Nelyo hummed softly in acceptance, hand still running up and down the child’s back. There was another moment of quiet.

“It was when, when mother- she was protecting the jewel!” Suddenly Elrond sounded bitter and angry. “She went away to protect that jewel and she left us with the nursemaid to hide. The nurse ran off to join the fighting and we, we, we- she left us all alone! Everybody was fighting, the city was being attacked, and she left us alone. She promised she would come back.”

The last sentence was spoken with a venom Nelyafinwë didn’t know a child could produce, then Elrond’s voice softened to almost a whimper. “Nana promised she would come back and we were so scared and she left us. We thought- we thought Ada and Maedhros were going to kill us.”

He sniffled, breath quick as he forced out the next words. “Maedhros wanted to. We were just little and there wasn’t enough food and we couldn’t earn our keep. He wanted to leave us like they left our uncles, all alone in the woods with no one to protect them from the dark. They didn’t but, but they could have. And no one probably would have even noticed we were gone for a really long time.”

Elrond gasped and the tears started anew, soaking through Nelyo’s nightshirt. He tightened his hold on his nephew, mind whirling in horror with all he’d learned. Had that really happened? Had Makalaurë and this Maedhros person really nearly killed a child? Multiple children? More than once? He was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he almost missed what Elrond said next. The Elfling’s voice had steadied some, though it was still broken up by sniffles and gasps.

“I helped. I thought, maybe, if I didn’t, they would still leave us. There were hurt people and not enough anything to go around. I helped. I healed. I wasn’t very good and it was hard, but I did. I thought I had to. Elros helped with chores. It made him upset when he couldn’t watch me, because the healing, it, it was- I did it too much if no one watched and it hurt me. Elros was angry, he wanted to escape, but he thought they might chase us. Ada found out, and Maedhros. They didn’t know, some of the soldiers, they didn’t say, and we thought-”

Elrond cut himself off with a terrified sob, tightening his grasp on Nelyo’s nightshirt and going silent for several minutes. “Ada and Maedhros didn’t know. Then they found out and they protected us. It was better. It’s still better now; I like it here.”

Nelyo managed a smile. “I’m glad.” Then he moved Elrond far enough away that he could wipe the child’s tears and look him steadily in the eye. “Elrond, listen to me. I haven’t known you for very long, but you’re family now. We won’t let anything like that happen to you ever again. Not me or your father or any of us. If you ever think something bad might happen, any of us will protect you. Alright?”

Elrond nodded, then resumed the embrace. Nelyo carried him over to Makalaurë’s bed and situated them both under the covers. Elrond was asleep in minutes, but Nelyafinwë laid awake for long hours thinking on all that had been said that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unfortunately, I've hit a bit of a roadblock with this story. I will not give up on this story, but it might be a while before I next post. Sorry for the inconvenience.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A very important chapter wherein things go to hell in a handbasket.

As they travelled to Tirion,  Elenéþa got to know one of the branches of her new family. Findaráto and Amarië were easy to get along with. Angaráto and his family mostly ignored her unless she spoke to them directly; Aikanáro rarely spoke to anyone, let alone her.

Artanis, who Maglor called Galadriel as he taught her his strange language during the nights, was the most welcoming of Elenéþa. She was friendly, keeping Elenéþa company as they rode with the lighthearted claim that, “Makalaurë is brilliant, but you can’t spend all your time with him.”

* * *

“Now, how did you meet Makalaurë again?” Amarië asked, drawing her horse even with Artanis and Elenéþa’s.

Eldalotë glanced up, curious, and spurred her horse into a trot to catch up with them. “I’d like to know that as well,” she said, adjusting baby Artaresto in her arms.

“The way I heard it,” Artanis started, smirking, “was that he ran into you while you were mending a net and you were entirely unapologetic when you pushed him into the water. And somehow you two managed to fall in love regardless.”

“Not quite,” Elenéþa laughed. “We met at a market. Makalaurë was hopelessly lost and I pointed him in the right direction. Although, my brother very nearly hit him first for the way he looked at me.”

“And you’ve been married how long?” Artanis asked.

 _A month and a half._ “Oh, not long, really. We met and got married right away, but it hasn’t been all that long ago.”

“Did you marry him before or after he disappeared?” Eldalotë asked, head tilted curiously. 

“Disappeared?”

“Oh, didn’t you know? Twelve years ago, he disappeared right off his family’s estate. Then not two months ago he came back married and with a child.”

Oh. Maglor must have glossed over that part when he told her story. Elenéþa only hesitated for a moment before lying, “We married after he disappeared, but before he returned to you. He already had a son when we met.”

Eldalotë gasped and Amarië’s brows went up. Artanis laughed. “How scandalous,” she said. “Do you know Elrond well?”

Ah, that was the name of the part mortal child Maglor had adopted. “I do not,” Elenéþa admitted. “We’ve barely ever met. But Makalaurë says wonderful things about him.”

“All true, I’m sure,” Artanis said. “He’s a lovely child, very polite and responsible. He’s a Healer and a Seer, too, but he is strange. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I’m sure he’s at least part Maia.”

Artanis was right, Elenéþa knew, not that she could say it. Instead, she raised her brows and widened her eyes as if to say, “Really?”

Artanis nodded eagerly and began to explain, at length, why she believed Elrond to be part Maia.

* * *

“Maitimo!” Nerdanel called out the window. Her eldest son called a halt to his training spar with Findekáno and jogged closer to the house. 

“What’s wrong, Ammë?”

“Your father’s been in the forge all night and he won’t come out. I tried, but…”

Maitimo smiled softly, though his concern showed through. “It’s alright, Ammë, I can help.” He ran back to put his sword away and gestured to Elrond, and though Nerdanel couldn’t hear what was said, she knew he was telling Findakáno to watch the boy while he was gone.

He reached through the window to hug her, saying, “Don’t worry. I’ll handle it.” With that, he sprinted the other direction, toward the forge.

Nerdanel frowned deeply as her son turned a corner and disappeared from view. Usually Fëanáro could be enticed out of the forge, even in the middle of a project, with the promise of his wife with sweets and a revealing dress, but today he hadn’t even let her in. She hoped Maitimo would be more successful.

* * *

“Is something wrong?” Elrond asked as Nelyafinwë ran off.

Findekáno frowned, but shook his head. “No, everything’s fine. Come on, it’s getting late. Let’s get you something to eat.”

Elrond nodded, seeming distracted, and grabbed Findekáno’s hand. Findekáno led the way to the kitchen, pulling Elrond along when he stopped. Odd; the boy wasn’t usually so easily distracted. He let go of Elrond’s hand when they got to the kitchen in order to retrieve a bowl, but the Elfling didn’t move.

Findekáno frowned deeply, abandoning the bowl on the counter and kneeling to Elrond’s level. “Elrond? Elrond, what’s wrong?”

Elrond shook his head and clenched his eyes shut, small hands pressed to his ears as he bit back a whimper. Findekáno allowed himself an instant of fear before sweeping the child into his arms and heading for the infirmary.

* * *

It felt like the world was splitting apart.

Fingon was speaking to him, face worried, but his words blurred into the background and Elrond shook his head, covering his ears in a vain attempt to block out all the noise. He wasn’t supposed to hear the Music this clearly, he was too far removed from Melian. The closest thing he could remember to this feeling was when he and Elros had gone to Naneth one night during a lightning storm, pushing the heavy door open only to find her sitting at her mirror, entranced by the Silmaril. The Silmaril’s Song had hurt, horribly, but not like this.

Elrond realized that Fingon had picked him up, then he was being passed off to someone else and someone else. There was shouting, whoever was holding him _moved_ , and the world greyed out.

* * *

Findekáno was halfway to the infirmary when Tyelkormo slid to a halt in front of him, grinning wildly.

“Makalaurë is back. He’s brought a girl.” Tyelkormo’s grin fell, eyes flicking to Elrond. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know, he just…” Findekáno trailed off.

Tyelkormo nodded once, expression turning serious. “Alright. Let’s take him to Makalaurë. He knows better than us.”

They reached the courtyard right as Makalaurë dismounted. Findekáno approached his cousin, catching his attention easily.

“What happened?” Makalaurë took Elrond, passing a hand over his brow to check for fever.

Findekáno shook his head. “I don’t know. Nelyo went to get your father from the forge and I took Elrond to get dinner. I looked away for a moment to get a bowl and when I turned back he wouldn’t move except to cover his ears.”

Makalaurë looked up sharply, panic and realization in his eyes. “Atar is in the forge?”

Findekáno nodded slowly, baffled. “Yes, since yesterday, but how is that the important part?”

Makalaurë didn’t answer, looking uncertain for just an instant before quickly crossing the courtyard and handing Elrond to a Teleri woman on a grey stallion. He said something to her that Findekáno couldn’t hear, then sprinted off toward the forge.

“Wait!” she cried, shifting Elrond to one arm to swing down from her horse and running a few steps after Makalaurë before she stopped. Her eyes were worried but her expression was determined and she settled in to wait for Makalaurë to return.

* * *

Maglor passed Elrond into Elenéþa’s care with a brief explanation that he barely heard about how his father must be forging the Silmarils.

Her lips pressed tight together but she nodded and Maglor ran full tilt toward the forge, ignoring the pain in his hands as he caught the edge of a building to throw himself around a corner without losing any momentum. He skidded to a stop in front of the forge, kicking up dirt and just managing not to run in to Nelyo.

“What’s Atar working on?” he demanded.

Nelyo looked confused and worried, but humored him. “I don’t know. He’s been working on a project all week, but yesterday after lunch he locked himself in and he won’t come out for anything.” He paused. “Makalaurë, are you alright?”

There was a flash of light from inside the forge and Magor heard their father laugh giddily. He knew without looking in a mirror that his expression was one of despair and he shook his head. “No,” he whispered. “Nothing is alright.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really like this chapter. It took forever to figure out what I wanted to do with it, but I'm happy with the end result. I might get out one more chapter before I start school on the 12th (junior year!) and then they'll probably start coming with more regularity since my time will be a lot more structured.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Ammë - Mother
> 
> Atar - Father


	20. Chapter Nineteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And Galadriel has entered the chat!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Turns out junior year is significantly harder than I expected it to be. I've got to start applying for scholarships and narrowing down my choices for college and on top of all that plus my regular classes, I'm trying to get a spot in a super competitive summer internship program. I'm also working on several other fics, and those will hopefully be up soon.
> 
> But for now, enjoy!

Nelyafinwë was startled to say the least at his brother’s actions. He’d caught sight of their group returning from Alqualondë as he’d passed through the courtyard on his way to the forge. Makalaurë had been laughing with a woman he didn’t recognise. Then he’d come hurtling around the corner, barely stopping before he hit the door, and demanded to know what their father was making, as if this attempt at marathon forging was any different than all the rest.

Nelyo relegated his alarm to the back of his mind when Makalaurë’s expression became one of utter despair and his knees gave out. He moved quickly, sliding an arm under Makalaurë’s shoulders and guiding him gently to the ground.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, voice calmer than he actually felt.

Makalaurë shook his head, giving in to unwarranted despair for a moment longer before he took a shuddering breath and stood, spine straight and face coldly disinterested. He turned to walk away but Nelyafinwë grabbed his shoulder and pulled him around to face him.

“Laurë, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?”

Laurë smiled wryly. “The world’s about to come crashing down around our ears.” Then he shrugged off Nelyafinwë’s grip as easily as if it belonged to an infant and strode confidently toward the courtyard.

Nelyo followed a moment later, pushing the shock away to be dealt with later and half-running to catch up. Makalaurë said something in that strange language that until now had been for him and Elrond alone. His voice wasn’t raised, but it was pitched to carry and his words were clipped. Everyone snapped their eyes to him, no matter that the didn’t understand a word of what he was saying. He looked out of place in the fine blue travel garb; he should be in armor, backed by craggy cliffs and barren land. This wasn’t the Makalaurë he knew.

* * *

Artanis felt the world  _ shift  _ and fought not to double over as she was assailed by visions. The rest of the family had arrived to greet their return as Makalaurë tore off toward the forge and she was able to move off to the side unnoticed, letting a wall keep her upright as she tried to force the visions to filter through her mind in some sort of order.

_ Irissë in white shirt and leggings, wandering through a dark wood, bow drawn and face wary. _

Irissë approached, eyes bright with worry as she reached out to her.

_ Irissë again, now in a grand hall, her shoulder pierced through with a javelin, speaking to a terrified Elfling. _

"Artanis?"

_ A tall woman who glowed with the light of the Maiar, a fine crown of silvered leaves gracing her brow, standing over a basin of water that shimmered in a light that wasn’t of the Trees. _

Artanis made a noise of acknowledgement and took her hand, squeezing hard.

_ Nelyafinwë, red haired and scarred but still recognisable, issuing orders from an infirmary bed, gesturing with a bandaged arm missing its hand. _

"Are you- What's wrong?" Irissë asked, a strong arm going around Artanis's waist to steady her as she trembled.

_ A man who looked almost Telerin clad in blood stained leathers sweeping her off the ground and kissing her full on the lips. _

"D’no," she slurred, letting Irissë take most of her weight.

_ A dark haired woman throwing herself from a tower, turning to a bird mere inches above the gravel. _

Makalaurë returned then, Nelyafinwë trailing behind him looking slightly lost.

_ Makalaurë striding into a marshaling yard in full armor, head held high as he issued orders and mounted a great black stallion. _

The hum in her mind dulled, allowing her to hear the conversations going on—or not going on—around her

"Maglor!" Elenéþa cried. Artanis frowned. She was involved in this as well?

Makalaurë—Maglor?—spoke in that odd language he rarely used around others. Elenéþa paled and pursed her lips but nodded firmly.

Artanis peeled herself away from the wall and walked towards Makalaurë, Irissë hovering at her side worriedly.

Makalaurë turned to her and raised an eyebrow expectantly, managing to look all of Nelyo’s height even standing a few inches shy of her own. “Yes?”

She took a deep breath and spoke a single word. “Maglor.”

She nearly laughed at the shock on his face. Would have, if it hadn’t been for the air of horror.

“ _ Oh _ , pitya min, have you Seen?”

Artanis nodded, refusing to let the tears fall. Maglor opened his arms, face softening. She fell forward and he wrapped her in his arms and they hit the pavers together, his voice raising in a lullaby he hadn’t sung to her in years.

Artanis sobbed. “I don’t want that to happen, Laurë, it’s awful.”

Maglor ran one hand up and down her back, the other holding her close. “We’re working on it. We’re trying.”

He sat back on his heels, holding Artanis at arms length as she wiped her tears. “Will you help?”

She nodded. “What do I need to do?”

“Talk to Elenéþa and Elrond. Back me when the time comes. I’ll need you.”

She nodded again, taking the hand he offered and letting him pass her off to Irissë.

* * *

Maglor hadn’t meant for Artanis to find out like this. Strong as Galadriel had been, she’d been nearly eight thousand years old, time granting wisdom and tempering her lust for power. Artanis was young, she hadn’t marched the Helcaraxë or seen her family die.

Well, nothing for it now. He schooled his features into a challenging smirk.

“Tyelko!”

His younger brother didn’t approach, frowning deeply. “What’s going on, Laurë? You’re being strange.”

“You said you wanted to spar with me. Are you ready?”

Teylkormo’s expression of wide-eyed surprise was cast in sharp relief by Telperion’s waxing light. “Are you sure?”

Maglor raised a brow, waiting.

Tyelko was still for a moment longer, then he nodded, uncrossing his arms. “Alright. Let’s go.”

He was still tense, bouncing slightly with nervous energy as they headed for the training area, followed by their brothers and several curios cousins.

* * *

Nelyafinwë took the position of referee, waiting for the crowd to settle and the competitors to take their positions. The spectators buzzed uneasily, but Makalaurë didn’t seem to mind, shedding his gloves and shifting his grip on the long, curved knives with the ease of much practice. Nelyo stepped out of the circle and gestured for them to begin.

Tyelko moved first with his short, broad sword, stabbing toward Makalaurë’s left side. Makalaurë stepped wide, blades remaining in a guard position.

A slash for Makalaurë’s stomach skated off one of his blades with a scrape of metal on metal and Makalaurë twisted, giving Tyelko the option to move back or let go of his sword lest his wrist break.

Tyelko backed away and they circled for a moment, Makalaurë looking utterly relaxed as Tyelko searched for an opening. He lunged forward, sword low. Makalaurë ducked at the last second, dropping his blades the short distance to the ground as he fell into a low crouch.

He caught Tyelko’s ankle and grabbed both of his knives in one hand, standing without letting go of the limb, instead quickly bringing it high to unbalance his opponent. Tyelko hit the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of him and send his sword skittering to the other side of the ring. Makalaurë stood over him with a foot resting lightly on his chest, one knife held loosely at his side and the other in the hollow of Tyelko’s throat.   


Their cousins and a few guards who’d joined the crowd cheered, no longer so subdued.

“I win,” he said, shifting both knives to one hand again and offering the other to Tyelkormo to pull him up.

Tyelkormo collected his sword, his free hand rubbing at his chest. “You’re amazing,” he wheezed, working at catching his breath as he left the ring.

“So are you. But you’re impatient. Let your opponent make his own doom.”

“Can I try?” Irissë asked, somewhat hesitantly.

Makalaurë’s smile held a note of mischief as he made a sweeping gesture at the weapons rack. “Be my guest. But I’m not going to go any easier on you than I did on Tyelko.”

Irissë selected a long, narrow sword. She was just as good as Tyelko, but she fought differently. She quickly disarmed Makalaurë with a wide sweeping arc, leveling her sword at his chest. However, she didn’t expect him to slide away and land a sharp jab at her side and she dropped her blade, curling over with a gasp.

“You’re good,” Makalaurë said, retrieving her blade and placing it back on the rack. “Just, next time you win, aim for the throat, not the chest. It’ll make it harder to get away.”

She nodded, and this seemed to open the floodgates, everyone vying for a turn to spar with Makalaurë. It seemed they had forgotten how different he’d become over the course of one evening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All the fight scenes have been choreographed and tested, so a massive thank you to my sister, who, as always, endured bruises for the sake of literature.
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> pitya min - little one
> 
> If my spelling seems weird, it's probably because I tend to switch between British and American spellings at random.


	21. Chapter Twenty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing this chapter was like pulling teeth. I was going to add a section for Feanor at the end, but I just could not get into his headspace. I've been trying for days. So you'll get to see what Feanor's been doing in the next chapter. For now, enjoy.

“Makalaurë was right.”

Findekáno’s hand slipped on the lute he was attempting to play and he winced at the off-key note it caused. The sudden non sequitur had surprised him after Maitimo’s hours-long silence.

“About what?” he asked, flipping the music book back to the first page of the song. “The advice he gave you when you sparred?”

“What? No. That was ridiculous.” Maitimo sat up, frowning. “No. When he came to the forge, I asked if he was alright, and he said that nothing was alright. I think… I think he was right.”

Findekáno sighed and put aside the lute, moving to sit on the ottoman with him. “Maitimo…”

“Finno. You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed. Makalaurë is pushing training too hard, my father will hardly take any time away from those jewels, Ammë wants to leave… Something’s wrong. I’m- It’s scaring me.”

Findekáno was silent for a long moment, then: “Me too.” He leaned into Maitimo’s side and a reassuring arm came around his shoulders. “It’s like everything’s suddenly falling apart. Everyone’s fighting again. What’s going on?”

Maitimo pulled him closer. “I don’t know. I don’t know. But we’ll be okay.”

Findekáno nodded. “We’ll be okay,” he echoed, even though they both knew it was a poor attempt at comfort. “We’ll be fine.”

* * *

Maglor was pushing too hard. He knew he was pushing too hard. He couldn’t help it; he’d thought he had more time. Now that he knew he’d been wrong, he wanted to make sure all the members of his family at least survived until Beleriand.

So he pushed. Everyone learned to use a weapon, even if it was just a knife. Irissë and Tyelkormo taught archery to those who weren’t suited to a blade, and those he knew would never take to the battlefield, like Elenwë and Amarië and Aunts Anairë and Eӓrwen and Findis, were taught healing by Elrond.

There had never been enough healers in Beleriand, and though Amarië was the only one to catch on to magical Healing, the rest were getting very good at mixing poultices and giving stitches. Patching up bruises and gashes given during over enthusiastic sparring matches would never compare to the real thing, he knew, but they would learn.

No matter what Maglor did, his father was more concerned with the Silmarils than anything else. He fought with anyone who tried to get him to leave his study, and Ammë was unhappy with this treatment from her formerly very loving husband. She would leave soon, he knew, and as much as it broke his heart, he couldn’t help being glad that she would be safe in Aman while the rest of them fought a war.

Uncle Nolofinwë and Atar fought. It hadn’t come to blows, yet, but he knew it was only a matter of time. And as soon as that time ran out, they’d be sent away to Formenos. He had to do as much as he could before that happened. Fortunately, he didn’t have to do it alone.

* * *

Artanis, as far as anyone at court knew, was very opposed to Fëanáro and his family. This put her in a perfect position to start rumors promoting their political stances: no one would ever suspect her.

If anyone asked, she would scoff and explain why Fëanáro’s policies were so awful, even as she reached into the person’s mind and said the opposite. It worked wonders for getting people to follow along with whatever insane training schedule Makalaurë suggested.

Time not spent gossiping or politicking was spent on the training ground. She’d taken to a falchion and shield, and sparring with her Aunt Írimë, who favored a long polearm, was always interesting.

Elenéþa had yet to get to know her new family well. That didn’t stop her from helping.

She was friends already with Amarië and Eldalotë, and she quickly came to know Elenwë, Herenyanel, and Sarnayeldë. From there, it was a matter of hours to convince them all to help her.

Ships, Maglor had told her, he’d already handled. Equipment they’d undoubtedly need when they reached Beleriand was quite another matter. So Elenéþa and her little entourage spent their days in the market, haggling prices for tents and folding furniture and other odds and ends down to the bone. Her fellow wives were baffled, but they were perfectly happy to get away from Maglor’s intensive training for a while, so they didn’t protest too much.

* * *

It was more difficult for Elrond to help, since he was, technically, a child. Still, he managed. He alternated between helping Ada teach people proper swordsmanship and teaching those who didn’t want to fight to heal.

When he had spare moments, he wrote down everything he could remember learning about or experiencing in Beleriand and Middle-earth.

Bone-deep exhausted and aching after a day of hard training, he fell into bed and wondered if everything they were doing would be enough.

* * *

Nerdanel did not appreciate the way Fëanáro had been treating her recently. She was tempted to leave again. She was prepared to leave; her bags were packed, shoved to the back of her closet so as not to be noticed. But she couldn’t bring herself to actually go.

So she wandered the training area. She’d been to one of Elrond’s healing sessions a few days past, and while she could manage the spells well enough, she didn’t have the necessary patience, and her bladework left much to be desired, so much so that even her sweet younger sister-in-law had tittered at the spectacle. However, Nerdanel found that she was very good at archery. It took far more strength than she had anticipated to draw back the longbow she’d chosen, and more often than not, her arms and back were shaky and burning by the time she finished training in the evenings, but she found that she was glad of the pain: it reassured her that she was doing something against whatever fate Makalaurë feared would befall them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maedhros and Fingon's section: I did not mean for this to get as shippy as it did. I'm not sure where I got the idea that Fingon is a poor musician, but I did, and I'm sticking with it.
> 
> Maglor's section: Where does everyone get the idea that Maglor is a wimp? Have you ever met an orchestra kid? Fuck with them and they'll bash you over the head with a music stand then happily continue playing. So is Maglor sad? Yes. Badass? YES. Also, I was going to have Idril among the healers, but then I remembered movie canon Idril. (Yes, she was technically part of the movie lore. Look up Hadhafang on the LoTR wiki.)
> 
> Galadriel's section: You think she's gonna sit back and let someone else handle the world changing events? It took me all of 0.2 seconds to decide on a weapon for her. Just picture Galadriel in the middle of a melee, shiny gold armor, hair in a crown braid, with a falchion and shield. She'd look like some sort of Valkyrie or avenging angel or something. (Side note: if you couldn't tell, I'm pretty gay for BAMF Galadriel.)
> 
> Nerdanel's section: Let her children go into harms way without doing something to prevent it? Hell no. Now, why longbow? A proper longbow can have a draw weight upwards of 185 pounds (84 kg) and can fire six arrows a minute at a distance of up to 400 yards (366 meters), and still land a killing shot through most types of armor. Definitely seems like a Nerdanel weapon to me. (Why yes, I am an archer. (Can't draw a longbow, though.))


	22. Chapter Twenty-One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I randomly got a strike of inspiration at 4:45 in the morning and I hate myself for getting up that early, but I love this chapter.
> 
>  
> 
> POLL
> 
> Which of the following is your favorite? Answer in the comments. (This will be extremely plot relevant in chapters to come.)
> 
>  
> 
> Finwe
> 
> Findis
> 
> Galadriel
> 
> Eleneþa
> 
> Feanor
> 
> Fingolfin
> 
> Nerdanel

The sky was a uniform grey. Trees bent in a quiet wind and rain came down in fat, slow falling drops. It had rained for two days, and still there was no trace of thunder or lightning. Outside, it was warm and silent, despite the endless precipitation. Makalaurë had let up on training, shutting himself away in a little room off the library with Elenéþa and Elrond and, of all people, Artanis.

Some of the family had gathered in the solarium, steady patter of rain melting into the background of light chatter as people painted or did needlework or read to pass the time. Itarillë played with rows of dolls on the rug, cooing at little Artaresto, who lay in his bassinet next to her. But there were no squeals of laughter from children playing in the puddles on the streets as there would have been in times past.

Carnistir could almost—almost—pretend like everything was perfectly normal. Except it really wasn’t. Makalaurë demanded they train weapons, every one of them down to Indis and Tyelpe, and when he wasn’t supervising weapons drills, he locked himself away and spoke to no one save his co-conspirators for days at a time. Everyone was tense and on edge, waiting for a disaster that didn’t seem to be coming. The city itself seemed to know something was amiss. But most troubling of all…

Carnistir’s fingers slipped and he hissed as his needle jabbed deep into his finger, blood welling quickly and dripping onto the white fabric stretched taut in his embroidery hoop. He set the project aside and brought the finger to his mouth, letting his thoughts go back to his father.

His father, who had locked himself in his study with his gems and hadn’t come out for days. Carnistir was worried. He sighed, near silent, and turned his head to the window. The overcast weather seemed almost an omen, and a fitting one at that. Carnistir hadn’t the same affinity for Foresight as some of his cousins, but the Gift hadn’t entirely bypassed Fëanáro’s line. He knew, as certain as the sky was blue, that his father’s current path would end only in sorrow.

Long moments passed, and Nelyafinwë appeared at his side. “A copper for your thoughts?” he asked, voice solemn like it hadn’t been in months.

There was a beat of hesitation, then Carnistir’s shoulders dropped. “I worry for father. I know not why he acts as he does, but too much time near those gems is folly. I have seen death in my dreams and I feel their truth in my fëa. I fear that there is little to be done.”

“I feel it as well,” Nelyo admitted. “A sense of wrongness, as though the world has been set askew.”

Carnistir looked up at him, eyes amused but expression grim. “You’re the eldest. Aren’t you meant to be the one to always reassure us that everything will be coming up roses?”

Nelyo was silent for a long time, then shook his head. “I protect you. I don’t lie to you.”

And that statement, more than anything else that had happened over the past weeks, terrified him.

* * *

It rained for nearly a fortnight. Not that Fëanáro noticed or cared, curtains drawn and mind fully under the thrall of his Silmarils.

Divinity, he’d discovered, was made up of light and music.

Harsh, white light, burning prying eyes and grasping hands. Light that poured from the source, breaking down limits he hadn’t realized existed.

Music that flowed discordantly, matching the screams within to the whispers without. It wormed its way into his mind, demanding his attention over all else.

He saw it in his Silmarils and wondered why the Valar were so insistent upon cloaking themselves in physical forms, on hiding a sharp beauty that the Children should be allowed to revel in.

His trance was broken by the sound of a door thudding unceremoniously against the wall behind him, sending his thoughts into a whirl. How  _ dare  _ they come to try to take him away from his Silmarils! He grabbed for the nearest object—a glass of wine from a meal brought days ago but never touched, gone warm and rancid—and tossed it back over his shoulder.

There was a yelp of surprise as the glass made contact—feminine, but not Nerdanel, so it didn’t matter enough to look away from his gems—then a shatter and splash as it hit the floor. The intruder came around to the front of his desk and pushed his shoulders against the back of his chair, forcing him to look up.

It was Findis, leaning over him irritably. Wine dripped down the dove grey of her bodice, gathering and falling in droplets from beads and pooling a little where her skirt bunched out before continuing its leisurely journey to the floor, the cloying smell making his head spin a bit. Findis was talking, he realized, too focused on tracing the path of a dark droplet making its way down the inside of her sleeve to really listen.

“What?” he asked distantly, tearing his eyes away with some measure of difficulty.

Findis huffed in annoyance and hauled him up out of his chair. He couldn’t seem to get his feet under him for longer than a few seconds, and he was grudgingly appreciative of Findis’ grip on his arm.

“Have you eaten  _ anything  _ while you’ve had yourself locked in here?” Findis didn’t sound concerned, just incredulous.

He scoffed. “Of course.”

“Right.” He could hear the eyeroll in her voice. “And you’re not wobbling like a colt. Atar wants you to put in an appearance at supper tonight, so that’s what you’re going to do, if I have to carry you there myself. Besides,” she added under her breath, clearly not meant for him to hear, but every syllable stood out in sharp relief, amplified by the Song of his Silmarils, “it’ll be good for you, you can’t just sit in here and wither away.”

His father wanted him to come to dinner…

He could manage that, he was sure. And he would not submit to the indignity of being dragged to his seat by Findis. He did his best to steady his legs and began making his faltering way down the stairs toward the dining room, wincing in pain—whether it was real or imagined, he couldn’t be sure, but his vision swirled sickeningly nonetheless—when Findis closed the door behind them, cutting off his connection to his Silmarils.

They eventually reached the dining room, far on the other side of the palace from his study, Findis taking more and more of his weight as the walked. Findis let him go for a moment to grasp the gilded handles of the door, hesitating for an instant and asking if she should call a healer. He didn’t answer, vision darkening completely, floor coming up too fast for his sluggish mind to do anything about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember kids, don't do Silmarils.
> 
> You can pry the "Caranthir does embroidery" and "Caranthir has Foresight" headcanons from my cold dead hands.
> 
> So. This chapter is a little different from my usual style. That's because I was trying to show how Feanor is starting to go a little off the deep end here. Let me know how you think it worked.


	23. Chapter Twenty-Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So here's what the Valar are doing. The next two chapters are fully planned and I'm really excited about them so those'll be up as soon as I write them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is super short, but I think it stands well on its own, so here it is.

_ No. _

It was said calmly, quietly, but it silenced the crowd in an instant. Echoes of the shouting match died and several long minutes passed before anyone spoke.

The Valar clustered together, all of them tiny before Ilúvatar’s great throne, regrouping and wondering how to continue.

After a moment of furtive whispering, scarcely a formality when faced with the Being who created Eӓ itself, Varda and Irmo were pushed forward, having been deemed the most likely to convince Him of their plan.

Ilúvatar shifted, draping robes and light giving the impression of impatience.

Irmo spoke, barely-there voice weaving a picture of a future that could be, now that they had a chance to make things right.

_ And if I do not permit you to bend fate to your will? Shall you follow Melkor’s steps, though you know not where he is this past decade? _

Varda drew herself up tall, her body a swirling swath of stars and darkness, waveringly solid. “And what did You do, Lord,” she began, bold and challenging, voice issuing forth strong and clear, “to stop Melkor’s dissent? Very little indeed. We do as we wish, and only when we call upon You do You intervene. The same shall surely occur in this matter.”

She nodded sharply to herself, and then, without so much as  a by-your-leave, faded to nothing, sweeping through the evening sky to her home on Taniquetil. The other Valar followed shortly after, leaving Ilúvatar radiating disgruntlement to an empty plane.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Varda. Easily in my top three Valar. She's just fantastic. And she's always kind of reminded me of Luthien, so I tend to characterize her as really confident and a little bit reckless.


	24. Chapter Twenty-Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of stuff is happening! At just short of 5,000 words, this is easily the longest chapter in this story.
> 
> FAVORITE CHARACTERS POLL IS CLOSED
> 
> Nerdanel won with 6 votes, followed by Fingolfin and Feanor with 4 each, Eleneþa with 3, and Galadriel, Findis, and Finwe with 1 each.
> 
> Thank you all for participating, the fate of those characters is now set in stone!

“We need a Nolofinwëan,” Maglor said.

Artanis looked up from the Sindarin lesson she was studying with Elenéþa. “What?”

He gestured at himself. “I’m a Fëanorian. You’re an Arafinwëan. We need a Nolofinwëan.”

Artanis mulled that over for a moment. She thought that, maybe, she understood what he was trying to say. “You mean, we need someone from Nolofinwë’s line in the loop to make sure they do as they’re meant to.”

Maglor nodded.

Elrond looked up from the rough maps of Beleriand and Middle-earth he was drawing on the front and back pages of a thick leather journal Artanis had provided for their planning. “Who?”

Elenéþa, resigned to being distracted until the issue was resolved, shoved the makeshift Sindarin dictionary into a drawer of the finely-carved table. Their little group had taken over a back section of the library. Being a largely public area of the palace, few of the doors had locks, so they'd commissioned one from Curufinwë. It was by far one of the most complicated locks Elenéþa had ever seen, with a half dozen different mechanisms to take it apart but only one correct. The lock had entered the library with the librarian’s extremely grudging acceptance followed by the demand that he be allowed to enter to retrieve books for patrons.

Elenéþa thought back to the matter at hand. “What about Irissë?”

Artanis worried at her lip. “Irissë is too unpredictable. So is Arakáno.”

“Fingon would tell Maedhros,” Elrond said matter-of-factly.

“It has to be Turno, then,” Artanis concluded.

Maglor frowned, then shook his head. “Maybe not. If—Eru forbid—if things go the way they did the first time around, if my father is killed as soon as we make land, Maedhros is going to be king. Fingon can keep a secret, even from Maedhros, if he really wants to, but I think Maedhros knowing might be to our advantage, if the Crossing goes badly. He always has been the politician of the family.”

Artanis thought about that for a long instant, then exhaled slowly, brows going up. “Findekáno it is.”

Maglor’s lips quirked up for just a moment. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could get a word out, there was a somewhat hesitant knock on the door.

“Just a moment,” Elenéþa called, crossing the room to start on the lock. She watched Elrond snap the journal shut and put it on one of the bookshelves, and Artanis and Maglor cram loose pages of numbers and words and drawings into too-small drawers.

“Quickly, please,” came Herenyanel’s impatient voice.

Another voice, one she just barely recognised as Laurefindil’s, followed immediately after. “It’s quite urgent.”

The hiding of evidence came to a momentary halt as Maglor and Artanis sent the doorway identical incredulous expressions. Elenéþa poked at Maglor’s end of their marriage bond, wondering why. She got an image of Herenyanel and Laurefindil fighting in Tirion Square, in full view of a royal delegation from Valimar.

_ They don’t like each other. At all,  _ Maglor explained.  _ For them to both be here without sniping at each other, something very bad must have happened. _

Elrond shoved one more paper in a drawer, and Elenéþa caught Artanis’ nod. She pulled the door open, allowing the unlikely duo to enter.

* * *

“What are  you doing?” Herenyanel asked, glancing around the small room.

Maglor ignored her. He turned to Laurefindil. “You said it was urgent.”

Herenyanel ended her scrutiny of the room, flicking a last suspicious glance at Elrond on Artanis’ lap with a children’s book and Elenéþa having crossed to stand at Maglor’s side with her arm looped through his. “It is,” she said, dark eyes grim in her lovely face. “Makalaurë, your father is in the Healing Halls.”

“What?” Maglor said dumbly. His father didn’t  _ get _  hurt, not badly enough to need a healer. It had to have been the Silmarils. Which… hadn’t happened the first time around. What was wrong this time? Fëanáro, before the Oath, had been far too strong-willed to succumb to the Silmarils’ dark song. Things couldn’t have changed so drastically so quickly. Maglor sent a prayer to Estë even as Herenyanel explained.

“At dinner, last night. Apparently, he just… collapsed. Don’t worry, we haven’t been keeping information from you. Just verindatar and verindammë and their children knew until this morning.”

Maglor shook himself. He’d been High King for thirty years, damn it all! He could handle a bit of unexpected information. “What about ammë?” he asked, far more calmly than he felt.

“She knows. She, Sarnayeldë, Curvo, and Tyelpe are in her workshop smashing stones.”

And Tyelkormo and Ambarussa were hunting since three days ago, meaning only Nelyo and Carnistir were with their father. Maglor nodded. “Alright.” He turned and addressed Laurefindil. “Did you both come to tell me that, or is there something else?”

“Melkor has been standing outside the city gates since the Mingling.”

Maglor cursed. Of course. At this time, the quarrel with Melkor was a purely Fëanorian thing. And with the rest of his brothers otherwise occupied, news came to him. Elrond, Elenéþa, and Artanis were all looking to him for orders. Maglor truly, with all of his being, hated being in a position of power.

He took a deep breath, and let it out slowly, his expression going carefully blank and his back straightening just a bit. “Herenyanel, thank you for letting me know. I’m sure you’d like to go back to Carnistir now.”

Herenyanel inclined her head at the clear dismissal and left the room.

“Elenéþa, can you speak to Findekáno about the  _ situation _ ?”

“Of course,” she said, pressing a chaste kiss to his cheek before sweeping gracefully out of the room, Telerin-style gown swirling around her legs.

Maglor watched her go, then turned to Artanis. “I need you to handle Melkor.”

Vanyarin blue eyes went wide and she shot to her feet. “Me? No! I can’t- He’s a Vala!”

“I wouldn’t ask you to do it if I didn’t think you could.”

“I-” She shook her head. “Makalaurë, I can’t. I can’t fight Melkor.”

“You won’t have to. Just send him away.” He moved forward to gather her into a hug. “And if you do have to fight him,” he breathed, acutely aware of Laurefindil still standing in the doorway, “I expect you not to lose. You were the only one of us to survive more than three Ages.”

Maglor pulled away and Artanis smiled slightly.

“You can do this,” he said to her one more time.

She nodded. “I can do this.”

“Laurefindil, go with her.”

Laurefindil startled. “Excuse me?”

“Just in case,” Maglor assured.

Laurefindil cast him a wary look. “In case of  _ what _ ?”

Maglor waved him off. “Just back her up and don’t get hurt.”

“Right.” He still sounded skeptical, but he turned and followed Artanis.

“What do you want me to do?” Elrond asked after a moment.

“You can stay here and work on the maps or you can come with me to see my father.”

He debated for a beat, then retrieved the journal from its shelf. “I’ll stay here.”

Maglor smiled. “I thought you might. I have to go see what all this is about; I’ll be back as quickly as I can manage.”

“I’m sure I can handle myself for a while.”

“I know. But things are starting to get stressful now, and…”

“And you worry,” Elrond finished.

“And I worry,” Maglor admitted. “Exactly.”

“I’ll be alright. Go check on your Ada.”

* * *

Tirion felt empty. A ridiculous notion, of course, except that lately, it really wasn’t.

Servants were being dismissed left and right, sent away seemingly at random for no obvious reason. The ever-present foreign nobility, too, had vanished. A Maia had come, sent by Varda and Manwë, and called the Vanyar back to Valimar and the Teleri to Alqualondë. It left usually bustling halls near empty.

Nelyafinwë tried not to shudder as the heavy door of the Healing Halls thudded shut, the sound echoing through vacant corridors. He walked, letting his feet take him where they might so long as it was away from his father, lying far too still in pressed sheets. Carnistir and Aunt Írimë were there, in case he woke, but there really wasn't a thing any of them could do but wait.

So Nelyafinwë walked, blocking out the helplessness with the echo of his footsteps on white marble. Herenyanel passed him on her way back to Carnistir's side, a pack of cards clutched white knuckled to her chest. It seemed he wasn't the only one who didn't know what to do. He cast her a grim smile, and she paused long enough to return it before continuing on her way.

Not long after, he ran into Makalaurë. Nelyafinwë turned a corner and Makalaurë stopped short a few feet away, wringing his hands in an old nervous habit and immediately wincing when it sent pain through the almost-scar on his left palm.

"Atar?" he asked.

Nelyo shrugged. "He's yet to wake. The healers can't find a thing wrong with him."

Makalaurë looked distressed at this, though for some reason, worry didn't look like an expression he was unused to.

"Laurë, Atar can wait just a moment."

Laurë looked up sharply. "What?"

"If Atar is going to wake, then he will. But there's not a thing we can do to help it along. It's out of our hands. So while we have the time, there are some things I think we need to discuss. While you were in Alqualondë, I spent some time talking with Elrond. I can’t say I liked what I found out."

Makalaurë winced and closed his eyes. “Oh.”

“Yes. He said, among other things, that you and this Maedhros you keep talking about were going to kill him.”

Makalaurë hesitated for a moment, then sighed and nodded his acceptance. "Findekáno would tell you if I didn't anyway."

Nelyafinwë frowned. This was becoming more and more strange. "How is Findekáno involved in this?"

"He isn't, yet. Elenéþa is on her way to make him an accomplice now."

Nelyafinwë put that aside to be discussed later, a hand on Makalaurë's arm guiding him to an empty sitting room.

They sat in silence for a long moment, then Nelyo spoke. "What's going on?" he asked, tone not quite gentle.

Makalaurë didn't speak for so long that Nelyo started to think he hadn't heard him. Then he gestured expansively, encompassing the whole room.

"All this," he began, hesitantly, "I've lived it before. I lived, and Elrond lived, and everyone died. We watched them die. And now, somehow, we have a chance to change that."

Nelyafinwë's mind whirled. That really didn't make sense, except that at the same time, it did, and it set a horrible, sinking dread in his stomach. "Makalaurë-"

Makalaurë held up his hands in a gesture of  _ halt _ . "Wait. Nelyo, please, just wait. Let me explain first. Then you can call me crazy or a liar or- Just let me explain."

Makalaurë sounded almost desperate. Nelyafinwë really didn't want to believe him, but the least he could do was to hear him out.

"Fine. Explain." He didn't mean to sound quite so terse, but, given the number of things he was dealing with, he didn't think it could be helped.

Makalaurë looked relieved and Nelyafinwë listened silently to a tale of darkness and three small lights that really weren't worth all the trouble they'd caused.

"And I can't let that happen again," Makalaurë concluded some time later.

Nelyo breathed deep, ordering his thoughts as best he could. "I believe you," he said. How could he not? Makalaurë opened his mouth to speak, but it was Nelyo’s turn to hold up a hand for silence.

"I believe you. But I have questions that I need you to answer."

Makalaurë nodded.

Nelyafinwë sorted through his multitude of questions, wondering which one he most wanted the answer to. Finally, he decided on, “I’ve never heard of Melian.”

“No one had,” Makalaurë said, like it was some grave oversight. “We should do our best to keep in her good graces this time around.”

“Why?” 

Makalaurë floundered for a moment. “When Thingol died, she screamed.”

That was an awful reason to fear her. “He was her husband,” Nelyo pointed out, because of course a wife would scream if she felt her marriage bond tearing apart.

“She screamed,” Makalaurë continued insistently. “We were halfway across the continent in Himring, and we heard her scream and felt the ground shake hard enough to knock us both off our feet.”

“...Ah.” Nelyo processed this and picked another question at random from his mental list. “When I- When I was taken… It was bad, wasn’t it? Not just for me, for all of you, too.”

A shuddery breath and a nod. “We-”  Makalaurë looked like he didn’t quite know what to say. “Carnistir kept shorting his rations. Curufinwë did it first, to make sure Tyelpë got enough, and then we found out. We had to make sure Curvo ate too. Tyelko couldn’t do it, we needed him healthy to lead hunting parties. The Ambarussa were the youngest and I had to lead, Carnistir wouldn’t let either of us do it.”

“So he did it himself,” Nelyo finished. It was an open secret among them that under the aloof facade, Carnistir cared just as much and as fiercely as any of them. If he thought cutting his meals would ensure his brother and nephew’s continued health, he wouldn’t even hesitate.

Makalaurë nodded, smiling slightly wistfully. “The alliance with the Haladin was good for him. Lady Haleth made him sit still long enough to keep a proper meal down before he went back to worrying."

“Good,” Nelyo said emphatically. He moved on to his most important question, the one he’d been putting off. "Who else knows?"

"Elrond and Elenéþa and Artanis know. I sent Elenéþa to tell Findekáno, so he likely knows as well by now. Laurefindil might know, depending on whether or not Artanis had to tell him anything."

Nelyafinwë considered this for a very long moment, then reordered his questions once again. What he really wanted to know was why Findekáno needed to be involved, but it seemed more important to know why Artanis might have had to tell Laurefindil.

"No one makes Artanis do anything. What makes you think she had to tell Laurefindil?"

"Ah… Melkor is, or was, just outside the city. I sent them to deal with him."

Nelyafinwë dropped his head into his hands and spoke, not looking up. "You had full knowledge of everything you just told me and you sent two people who've never even been in a real battle to face a Vala?"

When Makalaurë answered, he sounded supremely offended. "They aren't going to be fighting him unless it becomes necessary, Artanis is the most powerful of all who know, and two elves against a Vala is better odds than one elf against a Vala. I did my best with what's available to me at the moment."

Nelyo sat straighter and deliberately gentled his voice. "And if it gets them killed anyway?"

"It won't. We need them."

Not that that had ever stopped anyone else from dying, Nelyafinwë knew. But he didn't push, because he could only imagine how awful it must be to worry you'd sent your family to their deaths.

"Alright," he said instead, "why Findekáno?"

"We needed someone to keep an eye on the Nolofinwëan line. Irissë and Arakáno are too unpredictable. We considered Turukáno, but he became isolationist the moment we left Mithrim the first time around, and as badly as that ended, I don't want to lose any family members, so Gondolin has to happen. Findekáno is more predictable than Arakáno and Irissë, and if the Crossing goes badly we may need the political power that comes with being Nolofinwë's heir."

Nelyafinwë raised his brows. "You've thought about this a lot."

Makalaurë lit up. "Oh, we have. We've got lists and diagrams and numbers for everything. The only thing we really can't account for is Gil-galad, but we couldn't account for him the first time either and that didn't turn out too badly." He hesitated, seeming to rethink that statement. "Well- No, it did, though that really wasn't his fault. Rogue Maiar and all, you know."

Nelyafinwë could have laughed if not for the gravity of the situation. "Do I get to be privy to all your preparations now that I know?"

* * *

Maglor pulled crinkled pages out of the drawers in their little area of the library. Neither Elenéþa nor Artanis had yet returned, but Elrond had nearly finished the  linework on the map of Beleriand.

Maglor passed a few of the pages to Nelyo. "You're the politician, what do you think of this?"

Nelyo looked over the papers, then sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth. "I'm not sure about politics in Beleriand, but… This seems like overkill. Are you sure we're going to need this?"

"No," Maglor admitted, "but we might. And it's better to be prepared for something that may never happen than have our people killed because it did happen and we weren't prepared."

Nelyo studied him, then nodded. "In any case, it seems like it's all in order. I think you've covered every possible loophole anyone could ever come up with."

"If you think of anything we should add, say so."

Nelyafinwë nodded again. “Is there anything else you’d like me to look at?”

Maglor opened a different drawer. “Yes, actually, there’s this-”

There was a hurried knock on the door and Elenéþa’s voice called out, rushed, “Open the door!”

Maglor did so, worried.

“Don’t close that just yet,” Elenéþa warned, Findekáno following after her silently. “Larefindil and Artanis are right behind us.”

“Are they alright?” Maglor asked, mind whirling through a dozen different scenarios.

Elenéþa winced. “…Laurefindil is.”

* * *

Artanis very deliberately didn’t think about what awaited her just outside the city walls. She paused for a moment, opening the door to her rooms and kicking off heeled shoes, metally cursing Noldor propriety when her gown tangled her feet. She hiked up the heavy fabric and hesitated for a moment before she tied it off around her hips. Her mother and Elenéþa both wore less, she reasoned, and it wasn’t as though there was anyone around to be scandalised.

Well, Laurefindil was trailing just behind her, but given some of the things  _ his _  mother wore, he could hardly claim offense. Artanis glanced back at her cousin, who had the most peaceful Vanyar blood of them all and still became one of the greatest warriors Arda would ever see. She hoped that strength was innate and not something granted by the desperation they’d all felt on the Ice, prayed that he was even now strong enough to face Melkor at her side.

They walked out a side door and Artanis veered toward the hastily-built armory on the far edge of the training field. She collected her sword and shield, gesturing for Laurefindil to do the same. He did, if a little reluctantly.

“What am I doing?” he asked.

Artanis was mostly sure it was rhetorical, but she answered anyway. “Helping me send Melkor away and making sure I don’t die in the process.”

“And what about you?” he asked, a little strangled.

Artanis finished tightening her sword belt and looked up at him, meeting worried blue eyes in a face far darker than her own. “The same,” she said, utterly serious. She stilled under his scrutiny for a moment, then he nodded and they headed for the front gates of Tirion.

Melkor was waiting for them in a fair form that reminded her far too much of Annatar, wielding betrayals that had cut Tyelpë deeper than any knife could.

Artanis stood straighter. Even half dressed and terrified, she was a princess of the Noldor. “You are not welcome here,” she intoned in her best court-formal voice.

Melkor laughed. “Your palace holds something I wish to claim as mine. Your uncle keeps it from me.”

The Silmarils. Not good. “Nolofinwë has no quarrel with you,” Artanis said. Perhaps if she could stall for long enough, then- then what? No reinforcements were coming. They were on their own.

Laurefindil rested his hand on the hilt of a sword he barely knew how to use and Melkor's expression smoothed into satisfied understanding. Oh, Eru, this wasn't going to work, why had they ever thought they could deceive a Vala-

Artanis threw herself to the side as Melkor's mace appeared from thin air to swing down at where she'd been standing. Her skirt fell out of its knot, for all the good that had done. Dirt ground itself into skin and fabric and her hair caught on something heavy. She pressed her fingers to the back of her head, hissing in pain but picking herself up anyway. She didn't have a chance to check on Laurefindil before she was drawing her own weapon and moving forward to meet Melkor's next strike.

* * *

Artanis was screaming. She was at Melkor's feet, looking terribly small before the great Vala, back arched and blood  and mud dripping through her hair and down her tattered skirt in wide streaks, screaming fit to bring the heavens down. Laurefindil prayed to every deity he'd ever heard of and ran to get her. Melkor-

Melkor left. He turned and walked away southward, and Artanis went limp, shuddering with the aftershocks of agony.

Laurefindil dropped his sword and went to his knees at her side, pushing matted hair out of her face to get a better look at the jagged cut curving along her forehead. There were no other serious injuries that he could find, but the gash was worrysome enough. The skin around the edges was dark, almost grey, and tendrils of black crept down her temple, slowing now that Melkor had gone.

Laurefindil hesitated for just a moment, then shook her, carefully, in an attempt to wake her. Artanis groaned, turning her head away and gasping when the motion caused her pain. Her eyes opened, wide and watery, and Laurefindil gently guided her gaze to meet his.

“I’m going to pick you up,” he warned, but his words got no reaction until he slid one arm under her shoulders and the other under her knees. She whimpered, sounding utterly exhausted. He apologised, but stood anyway. He sat her in the shade at the base of Tirion’s outer wall while he searched for his sword and hers and her shield.

Laurefindil would admit, if only to himself and perhaps Artanis, that he was on the edge of panicking. They had fought Melkor; they hadn’t lost, but they certainly hadn’t won. Artanis was bleeding and badly concussed. He really wasn’t sure if he was injured or not. He had reasonable justification to panic. He pushed it back, crossing the uneven terrain to where Artanis was beginning to slump to one side.

He cupped her face in his free hand, waiting for her to look at him. She still looked confused, but she met his eyes just a little less groggily than she had before. He would take it. “I need you to hold these,” he said, handing her her shield and sheathed sword—the leather of her belt had snapped but he didn’t dare hand her a bare blade right now.

Clumsy arms wrapped obediently around the items, holding them securely to her chest. Laurefindil picked her up again and made for the gates Melkor had steered the fight away from. Artanis’ head dropped against his shoulder and he felt her breathing even out in sleep or unconsciousness as he made his way over trenches torn into the earth by Melkor’s mace and two elves being tossed around.

The usual bustle of Tirion was still there, but it was disturbingly subdued. Laurefindil slipped unseen through scarcely used back alleys. It wouldn’t do for the people to see their princess in such a state.

They made it nearly all the way back to the library without seeing anyone else, a feat which would normally be impossible. Laurefindil profusely thanked whichever Vala was on his side today. He wasn’t sure why he had chosen to go to the library instead of the infirmary, but he couldn’t make himself turn around. He rounded the last corner and nearly collided with Findekáno and Elenéþa as they came from the other direction. Findekáno looked terribly preoccupied, and it was likely only Elenéþa’s quick reaction that kept them all on their feet.

Findekáno cae back to himself and looked wide-eyed at Artanis, pale and bleeding in Laurefindil’s arms. “What happened?” he asked.

Laurefindil pursed his lips. “Melkor,” he said shortly. Both Findekáno and Elenéþa seemed to know what that meant.

“We’ll run ahead and get the door,” Elenéþa declared, sounding every inch a queen, and some part of Laurefindil’s mind wondered, irrelevantly,  _ hadn’t she grown up a commoner? _

Elenéþa held the door open for him, taking Artanis’ sword and shield and placing them on the table before shutting—not locking—the door and standing with her back to it, head tilted to listen for anyone coming. Laurefindil laid Artanis on a couch that had been vacated as he’d entered, stepping back at Makalaurë’s gesture.

* * *

Maglor didn’t have a chance to ask what happened, falling back on triage training from Mithrim. Artanis was bleeding from an obvious wound on her forehead and many other, less severe, scrapes and cuts. Dirt and small stones were lodged in a particularly bad scrape that went most of the way up the outside of her right leg. Cleaning the wounds would be a priority, right after caring for the grey-black gash on her face.

Maglor looked at Findekáno and Nelyafinwë. “Get warm water and cloth,” he ordered. “We also need bandages and something to prevent infection. Whatever you pick, bring a lot.”

Findekáno nodded and they hurried off to their task. Elrond stepped in then, laying small hands on Artanis’ temples and raising his voice in a healing song, one Maglor knew he hadn’t used in nearly an Age, since Celebrían had been recovered from her orcish kidnappers. It was more a prayer than anything, calling on Estë to work through a Healer’s hands to bring a patient from the very steps of Mandos. It terrified him that this was the song Elrond chose now.

Findekáno and Nelyafinwë returned quickly and Maglor set to work on the less severe wounds, letting everything else fall away from his awareness. He would never be a healer by vocation, but he’d long been a healer by necessity. He picked tiny stones from the congealing mess of blood and ripped skin, wringing water over the cuts to rinse away dust. At some point, someone brought a clean, steaming bowl of water and wiped the floor with a towel. Someone else tore a slit up Artanis’ skirt for better access to the wound. He spread transparent green paste from a ceramic container over the wound, then tied bandages over it all.

Elenéþa pulled him away then, taking his place working on the rest of the smaller abrasions. He cast her a tired, grateful look and she smiled softly, accepting a new cloth from Nelyo and turning away to keep working.

* * *

Elrond finished his spells and they settled in to wait. Makalaurë and Elenéþa claimed the remaining couch, Makalaurë’s arms around Elenéþa with Elrond sleeping the sleep of the truly exhausted between them. Nelyo and Findekáno talked quietly on the floor a few feet away, neither quite tired enough for sleep. Laurefindil sat at Artanis’ side, painfully awake, fingers around her wrist to monitor the weak pulse there, trying in vain to take to heart Makalaurë's insistence that it hadn't been his fault.

It was many long hours before she woke. Her eyes opened slowly, but with more clarity than they’d had since she’d been hit, and she whined. Makalaurë and Nelyafinwë woke at the sound, both carefully still so as not to wake their respective charges.

Artanis’ eyes roamed, finally landing on Makalaurë’s face. “Sorry,” she mumbled, slightly slurred, “Melkor knows somethn’s wrong.”

* * *

Maglor’s fingers felt numb where they rested on Elenéþa’s side. Melkor was many things, but an idiot was not one of them. How much could he know before any efforts to stop him became null?

“How much?” he asked, barely hearing his own voice over the rushing in his ears.

"'s gonna be hard," Artanis said, eyes drifting shut again, "but… hmm… 'll be a'right."

Maglor extricated himself from the tangle of limbs, careful not to wake Elenéþa or Elrond, and grabbed Artanis by the shoulders.

“Artanis. Artanis!”

She gave a drawn-out whine of protest.

“Galadriel!” Maglor snapped.

Artanis opened her eyes. “‘s not me,” she informed him.

“It is you,” he said, lifting her so that she was sitting up leaned against his chest. She her head dropped against his shoulder and even given the dark and the awkward angle, he couldn’t miss the way her eyes welled with tears. “I’m sorry. Artanis, I’m sorry, but I need you to tell me what you can. We might not have much time.”

“Hmm… Knows ‘bout you… balrogs… Númenor…” She trailed off, eyes roving around the room, then looked back up at Maglor. “Sauron,” she said firmly.

That certainly wasn’t as bad as it could be, but he still had a bad feeling about the fact that Melkor knew  _ anything _  about their plans. “Is that all?” he asked gently.

“Think so.”

“Alright.” He didn’t know what they could do about it, but he wasn’t going to bother Artanis further right now. “Sleep.”


	25. Chapter Twenty-Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've recently discovered that it's fun to screw with Feanor's mind. Not coincidentally, so have the Valar. Also, none of this was really in the plan, but he just kept doing things and eventually I had no choice but to go along with it.
> 
> I have everything loosely planned out up until the first couple battles in Beleriand, but I greatly appreciate any suggestions for what you want to actually happen once they get to Beleriand.

_ Fire. _

_ Fëanáro dreamt of fire and darkness and ringing steel and more blood than he’d ever seen in his life. He dreamt of Ulmo coming up from the depths and dragging entire continents down to the sea floor, leaving their inhabitants to drown or swim. He dreamt of twisting grey halls, shadowy and sinister, keeping him from all those he knew or loved. He dreamt of far more, but he remembered little, each image flowing into the next with no time to commit it all to memory. _

Reality and—memory? hallucination?—blurred together, making less and less sense as time passed.

_ He remembered a great lord of Middle-earth, who had still been a child the last time they'd met, weeping for lost love—had it been the short, bearded lady who shared his forges and beds and secrets but not a crown, never a crown, or had it been the Maia in a glimmering mask who ruled at his side, weaving deception that had broken him before the tortures ever began? _

What? __

_ He remembered a nís just a few meters from shore, dark haired and dark skinned—too familiar, too familiar and he wanted to be sick—swallowed up by a wave five times as high as her body, and a silver-haired nér in the shallows, holding back a screaming elfling who would have to grow up far too soon. _

No, that hadn’t happened.

_ He remembered every death as though he’d taken the killing blow himself, and he could scream and curse and lie all he wished but he could not, he could never, deny that it was deserved, that each death he felt had been his fault. _

He hadn’t caused any deaths, had he? Not since his mother...

_ He burned a dozen times over and writhed with fresh agony each moment. He felt blades slice quick and deadly, different bodies, different wounds, but always the same ache, like a punch until he felt the blood start flowing. Thrice he froze or drowned, and cold water and tiny shards of ice sent shocks of pain through rapidly numbing lungs. _

No, none of this made sense, it hadn’t happened, it was wrong.

Fëanáro tried to push away the images whirling through his mind, tried to rationalize the grim falsities. It only made the images flicker, then come faster.

_ A great flying lizard spitting flame over a pitiful little town, burning buildings to a crisp. _

Steady hands on his chest, keeping him still.

_ Mountains collapsing in on themselves. _

Someone saying his name, tone sharp like it was an order.

_ A desperate battle on a barren, rocky slope. _

This wasn’t right, he couldn’t remember any of this ever happening- would everyone just stop  _ touching  _ him?

Someone poured something foul down his throat, forcing him to swallow, and he certainly remembered  _ that _ . It was a sedative, a strong one if he recalled correctly—but where was he recalling from?

He didn’t get a chance to figure it out before he was sinking back into the strange dreams.

* * *

Fëanáro floated for a while in  the hazy grey area between sleep and wakefulness, the high infirmary ceiling overlayed with jarring, bloody scenes. He couldn’t make himself move. The images came slower now, but just as disjointed and confusing. He wasn’t sure how long it was before, at last, they stopped.

He shifted, just to see if he could, and gasped when it sent a jolt of pain up his spine. A dull ache settled throughout his body, but especially behind his eyes, and he shut them to block out the light. He felt the bed dip as someone shifted beside him, someone he hadn’t noticed before. A bit of fabric against his arm which he had initially assumed to be part of a blanket pulled away and a slim hand came to rest on his brow.

“Náro?” Írimë’s voice was soft, and he opened his eyes. “How do you feel?” his sister asked gently.

“I-” his voice broke, and Írimë leaned over him to pour a glass of water from the pitcher on the bedside table. Her hands hovered at his shoulder as he sat up to drink, as though she was worried he wouldn’t be able to hold himself up.

Fëanáro admitted, in the privacy of his own mind, that the action set sore muscles aching horribly. Írimë took the glass when he was finished and folded her legs up on the pillow as he lay back down. She repeated her question.

“Sore,” he said quietly, letting his eyes fall shut again. Sore wasn’t the half of it. Every part of his body hurt, and it was an effort to keep that pain out of his voice.

He felt Írimë shift slightly as she nodded. “That isn’t surprising. You wouldn’t stop shaking for hours after Melkor came. The healers had to sedate you.”

Fëanáro’s eyes snapped open and he tried to sit up. Írimë wouldn’t let him, pushing his shoulders back to the mattress with a surprising amount of strength. “Melkor was here-!” he protested.

“Stay still!” she snapped, sounding almost angry with him. That wasn’t right, Írimë was always calm and happy. “You just woke up. Stay still,” she repeated. She really was angry, he realized, though he couldn’t quite place why.

“I’m sorry,” Fëanáro said, not giving himself a chance to think about the words. Írimë deflated. Now she just looked scared, and he couldn’t quite shake the desire to sweep her into his arms like he’d done when she was still an elfling. He shifted to his knees, slowly so as not to draw his sister’s wrath, and pulled her into a loose embrace.

Írimë clung to him fiercely. “You just- You scared Findis!” she said, accusatory. “And then you started shaking, and we thought- The healers sedated you and they didn’t know- we didn’t know if you’d ever- if you’d-” she shook her head, pressing closer. “We were so scared.”

Fëanáro didn’t know what to say to that, so he didn’t. He just let Írimë cling to him.

* * *

It was days before anyone let him up, no matter how often he insisted that he was fine. And he was. Mostly. The strange visions hadn’t stopped, but they only came during sleep now, so it wasn’t as though he was going to get distracted and hurt himself somehow.

His various family members took it in turns to keep an eye on him, which, while it was nice to have his every whim catered to, had grown somewhat annoying. He was sitting up in bed rebraiding damp hair after washing out Nerdanel’s chalky handprints—only after Arafinwë had arrived and she had left—when Írimë dashed in, grey-faced and dressed for court. She leaned down to whisper something to Arafinwë and then they both left, quickly.

Fëanáro waited until he could no longer hear footsteps from the other side of the door to get out of bed. He took a moment to steady legs that felt like jelly and blink back the darkness that threatened at the edge of his vision, reluctantly admitting to himself that perhaps his siblings had been right in insisting he not get up just yet. He did so anyway, going to his rooms first to dress himself in something other than the standard issue infirmary sleeping robe. He gathered his hair back as he walked empty hallways, headed for his forge.

Fëanáro took side corridors to avoid the throne room where he could hear his father’s voice, doing his best to ignore the uneasy feeling that settled in his stomach when he saw no one, not even a servant. It didn’t really work.

He arrived at his forge and lit the fire, rifling through rough sketches and half-finished projects as it heated, wondering what to work on. His eyes landed on a sword he’d started weeks ago and then gotten bored with. The blade was polished to a mirror finish, too long for him to wield himself but perfectly balanced. The hilt was technically complete, but there was a place for a gem to be set and Fëanáro thought the whole thing looked rather plain. He picked it up and set to work.

When he finished, an unexpectedly short time later, he had fashioned a simple sheath of dark leather and inlaid silver and the hilt was patterned with the same, sturdy but beautiful. A large sapphire was set in the pommel, catching the firelight in its many facets, but it still seemed to be missing something.

Fëanáro looked at it for a long moment, then sprung into action, stoking the fire white hot and pulling a jar containing a previous attempt at the Silmarils from a top shelf. He stopped, brow furrowing as he thought of the Silmarils. They were still there, he could sense them at the edge of his mind, but it was… different. Before, it had been like a hole, and if he drifted too close he might fall in. Now it was like someone had put up a fence around the hole. It was… better.

Fëanáro shook himself back to motion, setting the jar on a table and digging out a calligraphy brush irreparably stained with decades-old silver ink which had contained very real, very hot silver. He would readily admit that that had been an awful, drunken idea. He set the lid of the jar aside and dipped the brush into the liquid inside.

It had been one of his initial attempts to capture the light of the Trees. Actually, he wasn’t entirely sure the light captured in his early attempts really  _ was  _ the light of the Trees, as proximity to the Trees didn’t generally dissolve stones and the light of the Trees did not show up only under firelight. Both of those properties had been entirely unintentional, and he really wasn’t entirely sure how he’d achieved either of them. The stone he’d used, a rough, palm-sized chunk of quartz, had glowed red hot for just an instant, and then begun to dissolve and settle into a more iridescent sort of light. He’d panicked and tossed it into the jar, and, much to his shock, the light had immediately damped itself.

Fëanáro held the brush steady over the sword’s blade, running over the wording his mind had provided. He was half certain it had been another of the visions, which had begun to feel less like visions and more like commands. He pushed that incredibly unsettling thought away and began to write in careful, sweeping tengwar.

* * *

Fëanáro made a stop to drop the sword off in the room of its owner—another of the vision-commands—then headed for the throne room. He listened at the door for long enough to know that the court was discussing his movement to be allowed to return to their ancestral Beleriand, then strode in, head held high, to give his own perspective. The room grew silent.

Nolofinwë, the only one on the floor which meant that he had been speaking, grabbed for his arm as soon as he was within reach. “You shouldn’t be up yet,” he hissed, lips barely moving so as not to be read by hawk-eyed nobles.

“I had to,” Fëanáro said, then launched into a speech of pride and hope and victories he was crushingly sure he would never live to see.

His half brother confronted him in the corridor after, and it felt like someone else was moving his arm as he drew his sword and set the tip to Nolofinwë’s chest, knowing full well that it would end horribly.

* * *

“I had to.”

The tone was about as close to an apology as Fëanáro had ever gotten, and Nolofinwë was so busy reconciling this far more earnest Fëanáro of the past few days with the one who had insulted him and his mother at every chance that he missed the beginning of his brother’s speech. He found himself glad of this, because Fëanáro spoke with such a fire that it was difficult not to be pulled in.

Nolofinwë glanced at his children and nieces and nephews, all arrayed to either side of Finwë’s throne. Most of them looked all caught up in Fëanáro’s words, but a few were not. Artanis was half leaning forward with a white knuckle grip on the arms of her chair; Makalaurë stood to her side, hands on Elrond’s shoulders and Elenéþa’s fingers curled tight in his sleeve. Findekáno was on the other side of the room, fingers laced with Maitimo’s and eyes wide as they both watched the proceedings.

Nolofinwë wondered why they all looked so worried. Certainly, Fëanáro was stirring up politics and upsetting a great deal of people, up to and including several Maiar, but it wasn’t as though letting a few elves go back to their ancestral homeland could really hurt things. Not unless Fëanáro did something drastic, anyway.

_ Of course, _ Nolofinwë thought some time later, heart racing as he backed into the wall with a blade levelled at his chest,  _ Fëanáro never does anything halfway, does he? _

“What are you doing?” he asked as calmly as he could manage, which still sounded a bit desperate.

Fëanáro remained silent, lips pressed into a thin line. Írimë came around the corner then.

“Have you seen-” she began, then cut herself off with a gasp. She drew in a breath and screamed, high and piercing, and there were answering footsteps a moment later.

Arafinwë arrived first and stepped in between his two brothers, knocking Fëanáro’s sword to the floor almost as an afterthought. “Fëanáro! What in all the world are you doing?”

Fëanáro just shook his head, running off the other direction as more people arrived to Írimë’s aid.

* * *

Nolofinwë let the door to his room thud shut behind him, dropping into his chair with a sigh. Thanks to that stunt Fëanáro had pulled, the council session had gone almost two hours longer than usual and a baffled Maia had appeared to declare that the Valar had decided to banish Fëanáro and his family to their house in Formenos. That hadn’t gone over well.

Atar had nearly thrown the Maia out, and almost every member of the family had had some protest. Makalaurë and his little group were the exception to the rule: they hadn’t even looked surprised. Makalaurë and Maitimo had stepped away from their cousins, gathering their brothers together on one side of the room and holding stubbornly silent even when the Maia spoke to them directly. It was likely a good thing, as most everyone else was growing steadily louder as time passed and their protests went unheeded.

Eventually, the Maia had decided enough was enough. She flung her arms up and called for silence, and several of the prime offenders had found themselves suddenly unable to speak. “I bring only the message my Lady bid me.” Then she turned to Nerdanel and everyone could speak once more. “Those of you who have married into the House of Fëanáro may stay or go as you wish, but you must choose quickly.”

Nerdanel had decided to go, as had Herenyanel. Finwë had also demanded to be allowed to go, and the Maia had nodded, eyes knowing. Sarnayeldë and Elenéþa had not. Makalaurë had nodded his acquiescence to his wife’s decision, like he had been expecting it, but Curufinwë had looked terribly hurt, drawing Tyelpë close.

A wry smile touched his lips.  _ Well, I did want something drastic. _

He stood, dropping his outer robe to the floor and crossing to the wardrobe. As he did, he noticed something on the bed. Curious but cautious, he walked closer. It was a sword of exquisite craftsmanship, and it looked as though it had been made specifically for him. A dark sapphire was set in the silver-patterned metal of the pommel, and the sheath was patterned with the same.

Nolofinwë lifted the blade, drawing it part way out of the sheath. It was sharp, he was sure, and he could recognise his brother’s work anywhere, a careful balance of drama and function. Glancing back at the bed, there was a note in Fëanáro’s messy hand.

_ Good luck,  _ it said.  _ Don’t get yourself killed. _ And then, on the back,  _ Look at the blade in firelight. _

Of course, it would be just like Fëanáro to boast about craftsmanship in such an ominous note. Nolofinwë rolled his eyes, but he stoked the fire in the hearth and drew the blade fully, angling it to catch the orange-yellow light. He gasped when delicate calligraphy began to appear on the metal, glowing molten red.

At the base of the blade, where in connected to the guard, was written one word:  _ Otos. _ A bit further down, in smaller lettering, was the rest, and Nolofinwë’s breath caught as he read:  _ Finwenolofinwë, third reigning High King of the Noldor in Beleriand, killed in single combat with Morgoth. _

Fëanáro didn’t have Foresight, he reminded himself as he turned the blade over to check for any further writing.  _ No, but he could have asked someone who does.  _ Nolofinwë tried not to shudder at that.

On the other side of the blade was a short verse from a song Nolofinwë didn’t know. It read:

_ Darkness follows _

_ after daylight _

_ and will stay. _

* * *

Telufinwë stood outside a locked door, expression creased in concentration as he attempted to hear the conversation inside. They’d been given the rest of the evening to pack their things and notify a small staff to take to Formenos, and they’d be leaving in the morning. Makalaurë and Elrond had gone back to their hide away in the library, taking Artanis and Findekáno and Elenéþa with them. Pityafinwë was distracting the librarian and his apprentice so that Telufinwë wouldn’t get caught listening at the door. Makalaurë had been keeping secrets, and they wanted to know why.

It was mostly quiet, footsteps and rustling paper and nothing that could help him find out what was going on. Telufinwë was about to call it a lost cause and leave when Maklaurë spoke.

“Good luck,” he said, and all the rustling and walking around stopped. “If we fail this time, we aren’t getting a third chance.”

“We’ll do our best,” Artanis said.

Elenéþa’s voice followed. “Be careful,” she said, sounding almost scolding.

“We will,” Makalaurë replied.

The footsteps started up again and Telufinwë didn’t have time to get clear of the door before it was opened. Makalaurë looked at him, and several more faces appeared behind him.

“How much did you hear?” Makalaurë demanded after a long moment of silence.

Telufinwë debated whether or not to lie, but in the end he decided not to. “A third chance at what?” he asked softly.

Makalaurë sucked in a breath, meeting Artanis’ eyes for an instant before turning back to Telufinwë. He winced. “Sorry about this.”

“Wha-” Telufinwë began. Then Elrond began to sing quietly, and Telufinwë couldn’t focus any longer. The world wavered for half a second and he closed his eyes. When he opened them, Makalaurë was smiling easily.

“Telufinwë! Have you and Pityo finished packing yet?”

Telufinwë put a hand to his head, confused. “We- yes, but- weren’t we just talking?”

Makalaurë frowned. “I don’t think so. Do you feel alright?”

He shook his head. “No, we were. We were talking and then… I don’t… What?”

Makalaurë looked concerned. “Did you hit your head on the way here?” He placed a hand on the small of Telufinwë’s back, guiding him toward the front of the library. “Let’s find Pityo. Elrond and I have packing to do, but I’m sure he could take you to see a healer if you don’t feel well.”

“But- you- what did you do?”

They rounded a corner and Pityafinwë broke off his conversation with the librarian’s young apprentice to meet them. “Telvo! Good, did you-” his twin cut himself off, peering at him. “ Are you alright?”

“I’m fine…” It came out sounding more like a question than a reassurance. Pityo looked at Makalaurë, whose face was still a picture of concern.

“I think he needs to see a healer,” their brother said.

Pityo nodded, glancing back at Telufinwë. “What happened?”

“I’m not sure, but he’s quite confused.”

Pityo nodded again and Makalaurë and Elrond started to walk away, Elrond’s hand in Makalaurë’s. Laurë knelt down, just a short way from the library exit. “You did well,” he told Elrond, not quite quietly enough to go unheard.

“Telvo?” Pityo asked, shaking his shoulder.

He startled. “What?”

“Were you listening? I asked if you found anything out.”

“I don’t… I don’t think so?”

Pityo worried at his lip, then grabbed him roughly by the arm and started for the door. “We’re going to our room,” he declared. “I’m going to pack and you’re going to lie down, and if you’re still confused when we get to Formenos, you have to go to a healer.”

* * *

“Fëanáro!” Nolofinwë swept down the front stairs of the palace into the royal courtyard. It was the Mingling, and Laurelin’s light was just beginning to grow brighter than Telperion’s. He stalked up to his half brother, and Fëanáro stepped back, eyes widening a fraction. “What in all of Varda’s stars is  _ this _ ?” he demanded, half drawing the sword from its sheath at his hip, not caring for all the prying eyes.

Fëanáro’s brows went up. “I do believe it to be a sword,” he said too casually.

“Don’t play games,” Nolofinwë growled. “You know damn well what I mean.”

Fëanáro’s expression became more earnest and his voice dropped, too quiet to be heard by any save they two. “I really don’t. I haven’t the faintest why I wrote any of that. It was as though someone else was controlling me.”

Nolofinwë pulled back a step, not letting his concern show on his face.

“The same. Nolo, you have to believe me, I would never wish you harm, no matter how much I may dislike you,” he insisted.

Nolofinwë searched Fëanáro’s face, then nodded. “Fine.” And with that, he turned on his heel and strode back into the palace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quenya Translations:
> 
> nís - female elf
> 
> nér - male elf
> 
> Atar - Father
> 
> (I'm not going to translate otos, first person to get it gets digital cookies.)
> 
> Quenya Names:
> 
> Írimë - Lalwen
> 
> Telufinwë - Amrod
> 
> Pityafinwë - Amras
> 
> I will forever headcanon that Lalwen is Feanor's favorite sibling. He adores her. He does love the rest of them, just not as much. And he does NOT like them. (If you have siblings, you know what I mean. You're ride or die for each other, but you'll fight the whole time.)
> 
> The verse written on the sword is from Lind Erebros' song, Fingolfin.
> 
> In Amrod's part, Elrond gives him a Maia mind whammy so that he forgets what he heard.


	26. Chapter Twenty-Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have a timeskip! (this is like three hundred words lol)

The years at Formenos passed quickly, in a flurry of preparations and pleas to various Valar. Maglor kept in contact with Elenéþa through their marriage bond, and she in turn passed on messages to the others in Tirion. They’d prepared for just about every eventuality they could imagine, and there wasn’t much else to do except wait and hope they’d done enough. He’d even managed to convince Indatar into fencing lessons, though he didn’t truly expect it to help.

Maglor didn’t bother to explain away Elrond’s rapid growth, and it didn’t seem long before they were celebrating his twenty-first begetting day. After that, it was only a matter of weeks before the Valar sent for Atar at the festival in Valimar.

They saw Atar off in the earliest hours of the morning. It was still damp outside and heavy clouds left a grey cast over the world. It would likely rain by evening. Maglor and Nelyo and Elrond ushered the family inside the moment Atar was out of sight, closing curtains and shutters and locking doors and gathering everyone in one of the few rooms in the house without any windows. Elrond ran and collected weapons from the armory, distributing them among those who knew best how to use them.

“Boys!” Nerdanel snapped at last, setting her bow aside. “What is going on?”

The three looked at each other, wondering what to tell her. Nelyo was the one to speak. “Ammë, we need you to trust us. For today, at least. There isn’t really time to explain, but something bad is going to happen. We’re protecting you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I am your mother. It’s my job to protect you, not the other way around. Aman is safe. What could we need protecting from aside from happenstance?”

The world plunged into darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since there's been a timeskip, some of the people are different ages now. Specifically Elrond, Tyelpe, Idril, and Orodreth.
> 
> Elrond - 21
> 
> Tyelpe - (Elvish equivalent of) ~16
> 
> Idril - (Elvish equivalent of) ~8
> 
> Orodreth - (Elvish equivalent of) ~4
> 
> Not sure how many of these are actually going to be relevant, because I have no plan, but here ya go anyway.


	27. Chapter Twenty-six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been putting off posting this chapter because I'm not super happy with it, but nothing I do makes it better, so...
> 
> Expect sporadic updates though November, if I update at all, because I'm going to be doing NaNo.
> 
> Text in italics is osanwe.

Maglor could feel Elenéþa’s terror at the edges of his mind, even as he gathered two of his younger brothers into his arms and took up a lullaby he hadn’t sung since they were all small. He was quick to reassure her, enfolding her mind in his like a barrier against the dark.

_ It’s alright, we’ll be alright,  _ he told her over and over, like a mantra.

_ I know, _ she returned at last, shakily.  _ But no matter how many times you told me to expect it, part of me didn’t believe it could ever really happen. I’m alright. _

_ Good. Is everything well on your end? _

Maglor felt Elenéþa relax, pushing the instinctive fear away and pulling her mental shields back up.  _ Yes. Artanis and I are getting ready to head for Alqualondë; we’ll be ready to set sail as soon as your people are. _

It was a question as much as it was a statement of fact.  _ We still have an encounter with Melkor to get through, hopefully with minimal casualties,  _ he informed her.

_ I won’t distract you any further, then. But let me know as soon as it’s over. _

_ I will. _

Maglor closed their bond nearly all the way, until he could only just barely sense Elenéþa across the many miles that separated them. This way, it would be less painful for her if he didn’t survive. Not that he planned to die so soon, but he’d long since learned that he couldn’t control all the details, no matter how predictable the enemy was.

By Maglor’s reckoning, there were about three hours between the darkness falling and Melkor’s ground-shaking footsteps approaching outside the house. In that time, candles and torches and the fireplace all burned bright to dispel the shadows in the room and no one made any comment about the heat, just shedding layers as it grew too much to bear. Conversation was quiet, if anyone spoke at all, and several people worked out nervous energy by servicing their weapons.

When Melkor arrived, the house shook to its foundations and everything fell silent.

“He’s here,” Elrond said, and those with weapons prepared for a fight, though few truly knew what they were fighting.

They listened to Melkor move through the house, searching for the inhabitants, and all the foreknowledge in the world couldn’t have calmed Maglor’s racing heart as the door to the room they were in swung open, bouncing off the wall. Melkor took them all in with a sweeping glance.

“Where do you hide Fëanáro?” he demanded.

For a beat, there was utter silence. Then Elrond drew his blades, holding them ready at his sides. “He isn’t here,” he told the Vala.

“Isn’t he? I suppose I’ll have to settle for you lot, then.”

He made to grab Elrond, but Finwë stepped forward, pushing Elrond and the rest of them behind him with an outstretched arm. “You will  _ not _ ."

Melkor looked amused, almost indulgent. “Very well.” And he reached for Finwë instead, knocking him to the floor.

* * *

Finwë picked himself up, grabbing for a sword that he knew full well would be more of a hindrance than a help. Melkor waved his hand, almost relaxed, and he was holding a mace. In the moment before the Vala struck, Finwë laid out his advantages: the room was too small for Melkor to maneuver easily, and Finwë knew better the layout of the house. It wasn’t much. Melkor swung his mace in a wide arc, and Finwë dodged away from his family.

He ducked around Melkor, drawing him into the hall and away from the other people in the house. Melkor’s great lumbering form followed with some difficulty, mace tearing jagged gashes in the walls as he moved. Finwë struck with his sword while Melkor was busy, scoring long, deep cuts on the Vala’s limbs which only served to infuriate him more.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his family going the other way, out a servants’ door. He brought his attention back to the fight, praying they would be safe.

* * *

“We have to go,” Elrond said, working at the hidden mechanism to open a servants’ corridor. Tyelpë looked at him, wide eyed.

“We have to help Indataron,” he said somewhat hesitantly, moving toward the fight.

Elrond grabbed his wrist, trusting Maglor and Nelyo to get the others. “You’re just going to get yourself killed. And as I recall, Námo does not look kindly on the descendants of Fëanáro.” Which was largely due to Fëanáro’s own behavior toward the Vala of Death, but that really wasn’t an important distinction right now.

Tyelpë shook his head. “We can’t leave him.”

“We have to,” Elrond snapped, pulling the door open and pushing Tyelpë through. “Indatar can survive the loss of one. He will not survive the loss of all of us.” When Tyelpë looked about to protest again, Elrond added, “We won’t let Indataron die, not if we can stop it. But we also can’t die ourselves.”

And that only made Tyelpë look more horrified, but then Maglor and Nelyo were herding everyone else into the corridor and they were too far away from one another to continue the conversation.

Being a servants’ corridor, Elrond had expected to find servants inside. The first they came across was a girl who looked just past her majority, her back pressed to the wall and eyes wide, glowing softly in the dark. Nerdanel stepped forward and brushed the girl’s hair away from her face where it had fallen out of her bun.

“It’s going to be alright, pitya min. Can you tell me your name?”

The girl sniffled and wiped away tears. “Alyatári, lady.”

“Very good,” Nerdanel murmured, in the motherly tone she still used on Tyelpë sometimes. “Alyatári, you’re going to walk with us. We need to be quiet, and not be noticed. Can you do that?”

She nodded. “What’s happening?”

Nerdanel guided Alyatári to join near the back of their group. “I suggest you ask someone else that question,” she said kindly, then moved toward the front again.

“I’ll explain,” Elrond volunteered. She moved to walk next to him, seeming intimidated to be in the presence of all but two of the royalty in the house at once. “It's really quite a long story," he began, " but summed up, the Trees have gone out, Melkor is here looking for Fëanáro and the Silmarils, and we're getting out while we still can,” he informed, gentle tone not doing much to soften the blow.

Alyatári paled, and alarm surged through Elrond as her knees buckled. He caught her around the shoulders and her fingers curled in his tunic as he hauled her back to her feet.

“Oh! Sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you. I'm just used to people taking bad news a little better than that." A lot better than that, really, but she'd been alone in the dark for Eru only knew how long, and the house was shaking like it might come down on top of them, so he didn’t point that out, just kept an eye on her should she stumble.

They picked up more servants as they went, some alone, others in groups, all of them entirely terrified. One of them came back to himself quickly and took the lead, showing them the fastest way out of the house.

* * *

When they came out into the back yard, it was still dark. Not that Nelyafinwë really expected anything else, but no matter how prepared he had been for it, this complete lack of light was disturbing. Dark, Makalurë had told them, and he’d expected something like winter nights when fog obscured Telperion’s glow. It could never be completely dark. Instead, the all-pervading light of the Trees had disappeared.

Most of the elves with them were glowing faintly, a fact normally attributed to the Trees. Elrond was not. Makalaurë’s glow was there, just barely, but it was there. Elrond just didn’t glow at all. Alyatári still clung to him, though, and Nelyo allowed himself a smile at that before he turned to Makalaurë.

“What do we do?”

Makalaurë worried at his bottom lip, looking toward the house. An entire section had collapsed and the sound of Melkor’s blows continued to shake the very earth. “I don’t know if there’s much we can do,” he admitted. “I think… we’ll have to wait until Melkor leaves, then see if anything can be done for Indatar. Then we join up with the rest of Atar’s people at Tirion and make sure no one swears any Oaths.”

“More waiting, then.”

“Would you rather fight Melkor?”

Nelyo sighed, frustrated, and ran a rand through his hair, dislodging a few of the pins holding his braids in place. “I’d rather our grandfather  _ not  _ be fighting Melkor,” he said, much more snappish than he’d intended.

Makalaurë knelt to pick up the pins, finding them by feel more than sight. “So would I,” he replied.

* * *

Finwë drew a shallow breath, making another grab for the sword that was just out of his reach.

Melkor gave a booming laugh and pressed his foot down harder. “Trouble breathing?”

Finwë tossed his head and flashed Melkor a sharp smile, like he might to a noble who’d stepped out of line at court. “Just a little,” he shot back, hoping to pass off the tremor in his voice as a result of the fact that there was scarcely any air in his lungs rather than fear.

Melkor’s foot lifted a bit, just for an instant, but it was enough for Finwë to get his sword. He slashed at the Vala’s leg, lips pressed closed to keep the blood out of his mouth. Melkor howled, furious and in pain, and lifted his foot high. Finwë rolled clear, eyes widening when he saw the cracks in the floor radiating out from where Melkor had brought his foot down. Melkor swung at him and he ducked. The door that had been behind him splintered and light flooded into the hallway.

Finwë turned to see what it was. The distraction cost him, and Melkor tossed him aside into an already crumbling wall. His vision blinked in and out and he watched the Vala take something—that was Fëanáro’s desk, how rude-

Pain flashed through him as Melkor walked away, and his consciousness began to fade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alyatári - I'm not sure how big a part she'll play in the story, so let me know how you feel about what little you've seen of her so far. Name means "queenly and fair".


	28. Chapter Twenty-Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know what's up with me and long paragraphs today...
> 
> Anyway, I mention a Gaialata near the end of this chapter. It's just the name I came up with for Olwe's wife. She isn't important to the plot and gets no characterization whatsoever because she's only mentioned for one sentence.
> 
> THIS CHAPTER IS WHAT EARNED THE CHARACTER DEATH WARNING

Elrond ducked through the rubble of the house, instincts honed through millennia of Healer’s training pushing him toward where he’d last seen the man he’d come to know as his great grandfather. His family trailed after him, picking their way through a bit more carefully. He settled to his knees in the remains of Fëanáro’s study, smeared with blood and dust. Finwë laid near the door, arms wrapped around his ribs even in unconsciousness, and there was a flash of a memory that he’d tried to forget for so many years, of a fiery battlefield and a king rattling out his last breaths in his herald’s arms. Elrond pushed the memory away to be dealt with later and looked over the far too many shattered ribs and bloody gashes, quickly coming to a conclusion.

“I can’t,” he said, surprised at how his voice broke.

A hand came to rest on his shoulder and Maglor’s familiar presence at his back let him relax a bit. “You can try.”

Anger surged through him. Hadn’t he been trying for six thousand years? “I tried to save Gil-galad,” he snapped, “and you remember how that turned out."

Maglor’s hand drew back silently and soft footsteps sounded as someone else came to kneel at Finwë’s other side. Nerdanel lifted Elrond’s face with calloused fingers under his chin and he had no choice but to meet her eyes. Those eyes that were always soft and passionate and indulgent, but were now filled with fear.

Terrified or no, her voice was as steady as it had ever been. “Let us help. You’re a better Healer than any of us, but some of us can manage the spells. Tell us what to do.”

Elrond looked at her for a moment, then nodded, anger draining away. He fell back on knowledge ingrained in him long ago, teaching healers both magical and not through some of the bloodiest wars in history, keeping his tone matter-of-fact so that emotion wouldn’t get in the way of helping. “The cuts first. The body wants to heal and it knows how, so work with it. After that, broken bones aren’t hard to mend. Make sure the ribs are in the right place, then heal them enough that they’re not going to break again if we try to move him. I’ll work on the head injury since that takes more precision."

Nerdanel nodded once, gesturing the twins to her side, then pushed a bit of hair behind her ear and set to work with her sons helping. Elrond closed his eyes and rested his hands on Finwë’s head, sinking into the familiar set of spells for a concussion, trying not to think of what the Vala might have done that couldn’t be healed by any but Estë.

He wasn’t sure how long he worked before gentle hands dragged him away. Nerdanel and the twins had stopped as well, though it looked like they had done so of their own volition. Finwë’s breath had stopped, his skin pale. Elrond turned away, burying his face into Maglor’s chest and weeping like he hadn’t since he was an elfling.

* * *

The farther Fëanáro got from Formenos, the more uneasy he felt, but each time he tried to turn around, he became unable to move, so, against his better judgement, he continued forward. He was just a few miles from Formenos when the world very abruptly darkened. His heart raced in his chest and his breath stuttered for a moment, but his horse plodded steadily on and he couldn’t find it in himself to summon up an appropriate amount of terror for more than an instant.

When he arrived in Valimar, Vairë met him at the edge of the festival ground, serene against the chaos caused by the sudden darkness and likely the many-legged creature he could see in the distance, absorbing what little light there still was, surrounded by the rest of the Valar’s great forms. He’d always liked Vairë better than the rest—she didn’t chase him away when he tried to copy her weaving techniques and she said interesting things without worrying about whether or not he should be allowed to hear them. The Valië’s many long fingers clicked, ever weaving something, and a few of her eyes turned to him.

“Fëanáro,” she said, her quiet voice cutting through the screams.

“What’s happening?” he asked, and he sounded far calmer than he felt.

Vairë was silent for a long time, fingers racing but eyes never leaving him. When she spoke, her voice was that of all the Valar speaking at once. “ _ We apologize _ ,” the many voices said through one mouth. “ _ Your father has passed into Námo’s halls, and Melkor has fled with your Silmarils. We apologize, and we wish you luck. _ ”

Fëanáro believed them. He hated it, and wouldn’t have listened if it had been only Vairë speaking, because she often spoke of events many centuries distant as though they’d already happened, but he believed it now. His horse turned around without his permission and started up the road toward Tirion. He didn’t particularly care about his increasing lack of control of his situation, absorbing the fact that his father was apparently dead.

His thoughts drifted for long hours, and it was only when the horse stopped and someone called his name that he refocused on the real world. He was in the palace courtyard, he realized, and Arafinwë was looking up at him with concerned eyes, the reins of his horse gathered in his hand.

“Fëanáro?” he asked again. “What’s going on? You aren’t supposed to be here.”

Fëanáro slid out of the saddle, landing lightly next to his brother. Arafinwë reached out, brushing tears off of Fëanáro’s face. “Atya is dead,” he said, and his tone was flat and empty, belying the tears he hadn’t noticed fall.

Arafinwë looked stricken. He shook his head. “You’re lying. No one has died since your mother. You have to be lying.”

“I’m not,” Fëanáro said, and this time he just sounded tired. “The Valar told me so. It’s my fault.”

Arafinwë clenched his jaw and blinked a few times, and Fëanáro didn’t mention it when the tears began to fall anyway. His brother grabbed his hand and started toward the palace. “We have to tell Nolo.” He didn’t deny that it was Fëanáro’s fault.

Fëanáro followed willingly. “Where are Findis and Irimë?”

“They’re at the festival in Valimar with our mother. They should be safe.” Arafinwë didn’t sound very confident of that, Fëanáro noticed, so he didn’t tell his baby brother that he’d been at Valimar just a few hours ago and it had been the epicenter of the chaos. He had enough on his plate without worrying about sisters who could be perfectly fine. And besides that, Fëanáro was sure the uneasy feeling he hadn’t been able to identify until the Valar had said Atar was dead would have gotten worse if Irimë was dead too.

Nolofinwë was on the throne which by rights should have belonged to him, but Fëanáro couldn’t get angry. He wanted to, and he tried, but he couldn’t. He suspected it was another of the vision-commands that had become frequent interruptions of his everyday life during the years in Formenos.

He watched Nolofinwë try to calm the court and realized that he’d grown during Fëanáro’s years of banishment. Not physically, of course, but even though Nolofinwë was one of the more politically minded of his siblings, he had always been somewhat timid and easy to read. Now, he spoke calmly, confidently, and persuasively. If he was afraid at all it didn’t show. Whether kingship had changed him or he was simply good in a crisis, Fëanáro couldn’t tell, but this wasn’t the same half-brother who had seen him off with steel twelve years ago.

Eventually, the court shuffled out the great double doors, placated, and Fëanáro and Arafinwë approached Nolofinwë. He looked at them in concern and confusion, standing. “What’s going on?” he asked, and then directed his attention to Fëanáro. “I’ve had a strange feeling all day, and then the world suddenly goes dark. Did you have anything to do with this?”

“No! Or… I don’t think I did.” Fëanáro was uncharacteristically uncertain. He didn’t particularly like Nolofinwë, but he knew what it was like to have a parent die and he wouldn’t wish that grief on anyone. He didn’t want to have to tell Nolofinwë that their father was dead. It seemed as though he would be telling him anyway, however, because his mouth continued to form words even after he’d meant to stop speaking. “Melkor made it go dark and took something from Formenos. The strange feeling is because Atya was killed.”

Nolofinwë’s eyes went wide and he looked to Arafinwë for confirmation. Arafinwë gave a tiny nod and Nolofinwë dropped into the throne, face pale. He didn’t speak for a long time, then he stood, expression blank. “What do we do?”

* * *

Elenéþa did her best to calm her horse as she rode. Apparently, it felt the lack of the Trees’ light as acutely as she did. She didn’t like horses at the best of times, and would have been tempted to dismount and walk if they hadn’t been on a schedule. Artanis had travelled this road far more often than Elenéþa ever had, so she rode a few yards ahead, leading the way. Her horse seemed perfectly calm, or perhaps the other woman was just better at controlling the spooked animal than Elenéþa.

It would be a few days before they arrived at Alqualondë, but they would have time before those Noldor and Vanyar who wanted to could gather and travel the distance, so they had time to be sure everything was ready. Their trip had been scheduled months in advance. Maglor hadn’t been able to give them an exact date for when the Trees went out, but he’d given them a window of a few weeks of when they could expect it. They had planned to stay with Artanis’s grandparents for that period, finalizing their preparations under the guise of visiting the city. It seemed Maglor’s window had been a bit off. That was alright. They would still have about a fortnight to prepare, perhaps longer depending on how long it took for a consensus to be reached in Tirion.

Their fortnight and a few days more passed quickly. Olwë and Gaialata’s people panicked about the darkness for a few days, but Elenéþa supposed that a city that was business as usual in the face of a hurricane could withstand most anything the world threw at them. Within the first several days, a few people, two dozen or so, had offered their help in loading the ships in exchange for passage to Beleriand with them. About half of these were dissuaded when Artanis informed them that they wouldn’t be coming back to Aman for several centuries, if at all. By the time the Noldor hosts arrived, they’d gathered quite the following, and none of the residents of Alqualondë batted an eye when half the ships in the harbor set sail all at once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Atya - father (affectionate)


	29. Chapter Twenty-Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is largely filler, but that's okay because we've nearly reached Beleriand!
> 
>  
> 
> Finally.

Their people were scared. They needed to present a united front, meaning there was no time to be fighting over the crown. Fëanáro seemed to agree, but Nolofinwë gave up his position easily anyway, not willing to take any chances when the fate of so many rested with them getting along for once.

It was several days before they could come to a decision. In that time, Fëanáro’s wife and children arrived in Tirion with a procession of servants, all of them dusty and tired but whole. The reunion seemed to be the catalyst for something.

In the few hours after Nerdanel’s arrival, Fëanáro hovered at her side, discussing plans as she bathed and changed into one of her favorite formal gowns, a silver satin thing that complimented Fëanáro’s red beautifully. Then they swept into court, Indis’s crown resting atop Nerdanel’s loose falling hair and Finwë’s retrieved from wherever it had been for Fëanáro to wear. It certainly made a statement, and more so because Indis stood to one side of the throne with her children, wearing no crown or coronet to speak of.

“We sail for Beleriand,” Nerdanel said, and a ripple of whispers went up among those assembled. She didn’t acknowledge them. “Those of you who wish may stay, but many of your royal family will go.”

Nolofinwë schooled his features into neutrality. He’d considered it during the long periods of planning with his siblings and mother between court sessions, but he hadn’t known that Fëanáro and Nerdanel had come to a final conclusion. He was surprised, yes, but he couldn’t say he disagreed. He expected he would go as well.

Nerdanel continued to speak, saying her piece regarding the logic of the decision, then she stepped back and Fëanáro spoke. He spoke with a fierce passion, of hope and life and the history they had on Beleriand. Nolofinwë thought that if he hadn’t already decided to follow Fëanáro, he might have been swayed. As it was, he could see that most everyone was drawn in, leaning closer even though their king’s words were more than clear enough to be heard anywhere in the hall.

When Fëanáro went silent, a cheer went up through most of the hall. Arafinwë was making a face like he’d eaten something sour and Findis and Indis wore identical expressions of fury, and there was a section of the hall that looked equally unhappy, but Nolofinwë would have no doubt that Fëanáro would not be alone in his venture.

* * *

Word spread through the city in short order, packed as it was with gossipy Vanyar fleeing the chaos of Valimar. When they moved for Alqualondë a few days later, Tirion was left largely empty. Arafinwë and Findis marched with their host to see them off.  Artanis and Elenéþa met them at the harbor, backed by around three dozen Teleri, all of them looking like they knew something Fëanáro’s people didn’t.

“We need to speak to Olwë,” Fëanáro said to no one in particular.

Elenéþa shook her head, silver braid bouncing. “We’ve done that already. Ships and crews are ready and waiting for your order, my lord.”

Fëanáro’s brows went up. “Really?”

A nod.

“And you and your Teleri know what to do?” Fëanáro asked, gesturing at the people assembled behind her. She nodded again. Fëanáro was silent for a moment, then he turned, pitching his voice to carry. “Princess Elenéþa is in command until we make land in Beleriand. We begin boarding as soon as we may.”

The crowd began breaking off into smaller pieces, doing as Elenéþa directed. Fëanáro held back with his sons. Nolofinwë and his stood nearby and Nerdanel was moving through the crowds doing—he wasn’t really sure what his wife was doing, but it would no doubt be something useful.

Fëanáro turned to Arafinwë, who seemed distracted. “Ara?” he asked softly.

His brother jolted out of his musings, his shoulders jumping as he looked up sharply. “Yes?”

Fëanáro hesitated for the barest of instants, then spoke. “I’m not going to be here to be king, and Findis is moving to Valimar with your mother when it’s rebuilt. The crown falls to you.” He removed said crown from his own head and placed it atop his brother’s, carding the tips of his fingers through the soft golden curls for a moment.

Arafinwë’s eyes went wide and he touched the crown like it might not be real. “Náro, I can’t.”

“You can. You have to.”

Arafinwë shook his head. “No! I’m not- would you make Nelyo do this? And he’s older than me!”

Fëanáro’s face grew solemn and he took his brother’s hands in his. “You can do this. Ara, I know you can. And you’ll make an excellent king.”

Arafinwë continued to shake his head in denial, eyes wide and face a little pale. Fëanáro did the only thing he could think of.

He knelt, head bowed.

In either side of his vision, he saw his sons doing the same, and he heard the rest of the crowd begin to follow. Arafinwë took a half step back, thrown off balance by all of these people bowing to  _ him _ .

“Fëanáro, get up,” he said, sounding upset but accepting. He raised his voice to be heard through the harbor. “Stand up. All of you, stand up.” It took a few minutes, but eventually, the attention was off of Arafinwë. He looked at Fëanáro, looking a little as though he might cry.

“Arafinwë-”

He held up a hand for silence. “I know. I don’t want to, but no one else is going to be here. I just… When should I expect you back?”

Fëanáro was silent for a beat too long. “You shouldn’t. You’re the High King now, and you will be for the foreseeable future.”

Arafiwë did cry then, sobbing softly into Fëanáro’s chest until they were parted by Elenéþa coming to tell Fëanáro that it was time for him to board.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, this chapter is mostly filler. (But it wouldn't have been if my English teacher hadn't decided we all had to do SAT prep in the middle of my writing flow. I'm very salty at her and could rant but I won't subject you to that.)
> 
> Quenya Translations:
> 
> Atya - father (affectionate)
> 
> Finarfin saying that he's younger than Maedhros: Finarfin is sixty-one years younger than Feanor. Fëanor married Nerdanel "in his early youth." They love each other a lot and if you're gonna have seven kids you have to get started right away, thus Maedhros is older than Finarfin by a maximum of ten years. (Or one Valian year.)


	30. Chapter Twenty-Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I tried my hand at romance this chapter because I wanted to give you guys some fluff before I rip your hearts out in Chapter Thirty-One.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I know jack about boats. I'd rather swim.

The sea was angry. Sheets of rain pounded against the decks of the ships and lightning cracked through the air, illuminating high waves for just an instant before they bore down. Elenéþa looped a length of rope around her waist, made the proper prayers to Ossë and Uinen, and walked carefully across the slick deck to retrieve her wayward husband from where he stood near the railing, shouting across the gap between theirs and another ship.

Of course, he hadn’t listened when everyone without proper training had been ordered below deck, not that anyone had really expected the royal family to listen. At the very least, though, he could have paused in his conversation to observe standard safety procedures. Elenéþa put her arm through Maglor’s and held on tight, leaning in close so she wouldn’t have to raise her voice.

“It isn’t safe to be up here in this. You’ll be tossed overboard,” she said, and it had a tone of pleading. “Come below deck with me; the rest of your family have been convinced down there already.”

Maglor glanced at her, uncertain, then turned back to his conversation. His arm went around her more securely, though, helping keep them both steady against the ship’s motion.

“Can this wait until we make land?” Elenéþa asked a little desperately. Maglor pondered that for a moment, then nodded, only a little hesitant, and they started for the door to the hold.

The ship tilted with a wave, and lightning cast everything in sharp relief before fading back to darkness, leaving a blinding after image. Elenéþa felt the deck dip away for a moment and through the sickening feeling of being in the air when she shouldn’t, she tightened her hold on Maglor’s arm. Then the deck came back up and the air was knocked out of her as she slid into the railing. Maglor had both arms round her waist, almost tight enough to bruise, and when she caught her breath, they moved back to the relative safety near the mast. A crew member held open the hatch for them, and Maglor kept a hold on her hand even as they scrambled down the ladder.

The ships were crowded, with a half dozen people packed into each cabin; some were shuffling around the narrow halls like they weren’t sure where they should be. Elenéþa watched Maglor fumble with the latch on the door to the cabin they were sharing with Elrond, Nelyafinwë, Artanis, and Findekáno, and she realized that they were both shaking.

They could have died.

She didn’t think. She just dragged his hands away from the lock and kissed him. He was still for a moment, then his arms came back up around her waist, holding her close even as they broke apart.

“I don’t want to lose you,” she said, slightly muffled against his shoulder.

“Nor I you,” he said quietly, pressing soft kisses to the top of her head.

They stood there for a moment longer, each enjoying the other’s presence, then slipped into their cabin.

* * *

Their arrival in Beleriand was surprisingly anticlimactic. Makalaurë said this was good, and scolded Findekáno each time he expressed boredom over it. There were no ships to be burned and no one had attempted to cross the Helcaraxë—there had been no need to, as Nolofinwë’s people were on the boats with Fëanáro’s and those who’d stayed behind had no desire to come. So, instead of dramatics, they set to building.

Makalaurë had informed them that the stretch of shore where they’d made land was decidedly not Mithrim, but that didn’t particularly matter. They set to building a city several miles inland, nestled within the slopes of a chain of mountains that stretched as far as the eye could see. Their camp, and by extension, the city, was high enough to be cold, but not so high as to have snow year round.

“You know,” Makalaurë said one evening, looking over his wife’s shoulder at a map with his arms looped round her waist in one of the many grossly affectionate displays they’d become prone to lately, “I think we might have ended up in Nevrast. I never visited Vinyamar, but there really aren’t very many mountain chains that lead right up to the sea.”

Where they’d ended up wasn’t a particularly pressing issue so long as it wasn’t Angband, so Findekáno didn’t comment on that. Instead he said, “You two are  _ disgusting _ .” He was trying for disdain, but it came out sounding only mildly exasperated.

Elenéþa tipped her head back and laughed. “And you and Nelyo aren’t?”

Findekáno could feel his cheeks flushing as he shook his head, but she wasn’t wrong. Maitimo’s arm laid across his shoulders, the two of them curled together on one of the low camp benches crammed into the tent. “We- that’s- no!”

Makalaurë cast him a deadpan look over Elenéþa’s shoulder. “At least we don’t  _ deny  _ that we’re disgusting.”


	31. Chapter Thirty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I started this chapter, I expected it to be around seven thousand words. Instead, it's sitting pretty at 10,265. And I know I said there wouldn't be any November updates, but I've been steadily chipping away at this all month and didn't want to make you wait any longer than you had to.
> 
> Note that this fic subscribes to the version of canon where Daeron is Luthien's brother and the Arkenstone is not a Silmaril.
> 
> Also, I've beaten the timelines into submission for this chapter, because it's a time travel fic and I'm allowed to do that.

For several weeks, nothing of note happened save the coming-into-existence of the Moon and Sun. Elenéþa was glad of this, though, because it was a chance to regroup after the chaos that had surrounded their departure from Aman. With everyone pitching in, it wasn’t long before their city was livable, if not entirely finished, and Fëanáro dubbed it Orontavar.

Of course, it was foolish to think that they could delay relations with Thingol’s people forever, not that they had any reason to do so this time around. Still, they didn’t actively seek out any Sindar. It was nearing noon on the third day of their eighth week in Beleriand when a small group of Doriathrim arrived at the city gates, all of them armed. They were welcomed and shown to quarters in one of the more complete guest halls of the palace.

That evening, they dined with the royal family. Fëanáro was fascinated by their language, despite the fact that he couldn’t speak a word of it. He muddled through the first half of dinner, due in part to his own fumbling pronunciation of their words but largely because of Nerdanel’s embarrassed hand gestures.

When Fëanáro stumbled over a Sindarin phrase badly enough to insult himself and the ambassadors began to snicker, Elenéþa took pity on her father-in-law and stepped in.

“May I?” she asked, setting her fork aside. Fëanáro nodded and gestured for her to proceed, flushing to the tips of his ears when he gathered that he’d said something wrong.

Elenéþa smiled and turned to the man who’d established himself as the leader of the delegation from Doriath. “I am Elenéþa, a princess of the Noldor,” she said in Sindarin. “Let me be the first to welcome you to the city of Orontavar in a language you know.”

The silver-haired man returned her smile, seeming relieved to finally meet someone he could understand. “I am Prince Daeron of Doriath. My companions are Mablung and Beleg, two of King Thingol’s captains.” He gestured first to a man who was tall even sitting down and then to a man with a cheerful face and pale hair. “There have been rumors for several weeks about a new city in the mountains, but I can’t say I believed them until we happened upon it ourselves.”

“And what brings you to Nevrast?” Elenéþa asked.

“Rumors must be investigated. Since this city does, in fact, exist, and none who reside here seem particularly hostile, we would like to negotiate a… treaty, of sorts.”

“Terms for our residence in Beleriand, you mean.”

“Well, ah, to put it bluntly,” Daeron conceded. “Friendly terms, of course. But I think that can wait a day or two.”

Elenéþa raised her brows. “Why? What pressing business could you have in a city you’ve never heard of?”

Daeron looked surprised. She wondered what he’d expected to do with the extra days. “None at all, I suppose. You will make an excellent queen, Princess Elenéþa.”

If Elenéþa shook her head, masking her alarm at the prospect. Reigning monarchs of the Noldor didn’t tend to live very long. “Oh, no, I have no intention of ever taking the throne, nor does my husband. We’re both perfectly content in the shadows.”

It was Daeron’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “A shame. I’m sure you’d do wonderfully. In any case, terms need to be discussed and a treaty drawn up.”

“Of course,” Elenéþa agreed. She quickly summarized the conversation in Quenya for those at the table who spoke no Sindarin, then turned to Elrond. “Elrond, dear, would you mind fetching a few documents from my things? You know which ones.”

He nodded and politely excused himself from the table.

“Elrond is a Sindarin name,” Mablung observed after a moment.

“It is,” Maglor said before Elenéþa could, not quite grinning at the identical looks of confusion the three Doriathrim wore.

Elenéþa rolled her eyes fondly. “What my husband means to say,” she said, scolding Maglor about his antics through their marriage bond at the same time, “is that Elrond was a fosterling. We adopted him when he was young and have raised him ever since.”

Confusion smoothed out into understanding. Conversation continued around the table for several more minutes, until Elrond returned and dropped a stack of yellowed parchment on the table in front of Elenéþa.

“Sorry it took so long,” he murmured. “I ran into a maid on the stairs and had to help her pick up dropped laundry.

“Was the maid Alyatári?” Elenéþa teased gently.

At the same time, Telperinquar said, “Laundry is an entirely see-through excuse, El.”

Elrond reddened, directing his ire at Tyelpë with a rude gesture. Nelyo smacked him upside the head for that. “You two can discuss this later. Not at the dinner table and certainly not in front of guests.”

Both boys looked appropriately contrite. “I apologize,” they said in unison.

Nelyo nodded. “Good. Now, Elenéþa, you mentioned a potential treaty?”

“Ah, yes.” Elenéþa unfolded the documents, handing one, in Sindarin, to Daeron and his companions and passing the Quenya copy to Nerdanel and Fëanáro. “It’s only a rough outline, of course, but it’s a place to start,” she said in Sindarin, then repeated herself in Quenya.

* * *

Negotiations dragged on for several days, as small details kept needing to be changed, but eventually, a final copy of the treaty was written out in neat calligraphy, the Sindarin Cirth side-by-side with the Quenya Tengwar. Then it was copied, one to return to Orontavar and one to remain in Doriath after Thingol and Melian signed.

Fëanáro and Nerdanel signed at the bottom of each treaty, then each was stamped with the royal seal and the scribe let the ink dry before rolling each copy into a tube to be handed off to Daeron when the Doriath party left the following morning.

Elrond was to go to Doriath as a representative of Fëanáro’s people, outwardly because he spoke Sindarin, though Makalaurë arranged it as such because Elrond shared Melian’s blood and would likely be the least likely to get caught up in her glory. He would get the treaty signed and return to Orontavar in short order.

Artanis volunteered to go as well, citing her kinship with the realm’s king, though she had her own, less diplomatic reasons for making the trip. Her dreams of late had, increasingly often, featured the man she knew had been her husband once, and she found that she couldn’t help falling in love with him all over again. One of her favorite visions was of the two of them in a bed together, a newborn infant crowned with wisps of silver hair held between them. She wanted that again.

The day of their departure, several others were already gathered outside the gates of the city. Nelyafinwë and several of his own followers were milling about on one side of the path, every horse loaded with supplies and their riders just waiting to leave. Irissë was there as well, moving through the small crowd talking to children and checking over packs. Nelyo waved her over.

“Where are you going?” she asked, though she had an idea.

“I’m off to build Himring. It’s best that we have eyes on Moringotto as soon as possible.”

Artanis nodded. He was right, of course. Moringotto had been disturbingly quiet since he’d taken the Silmarils, and though spiders did sometimes attempt to build their webs on the city walls, they’d been mostly dissuaded by nightly patrols of spearmen. It was too easy, and it set everyone’s teeth on edge, even those who didn’t know that they’d done this once before.

Nelyo smiled and clapped her on the shoulder. “Relax. You’re going to Doriath, and you have permission to stay indefinitely. Send Elrond back with the treaty, then get your training from Melian and meet your husband.”

Artanis returned the smile. “I plan to.”

* * *

The trip to Menegroth, while long, was largely uneventful. There was a skirmish with a few spiders in the foothills of the mountains, but they were easily evaded and didn’t pursue their group once they reached the large stretch of plains between Nevrast and Doriath.

Artanis could feel the ripple of power moving aside to let them pass through Melian’s Girdle, and she was startled out of her thoughts, pulling her mental shields in a bit more. The Maia queen’s presence was nearly overwhelming, even at the borders of her realm. Elrond glanced at her, then she felt his own presence extend around the two of them, pushing Melian’s intensity back to a tolerable level. When they entered Menegroth proper, Artanis gasped slightly at its beauty.

The city radiated out from a central pillar, with staggered levels shooting off like branches, suspended seemingly by thin air. Much of the city was underground, with only an outer edge of the ground level open to the elements, but great windows were carved in the pale ceiling of the cave, their edges patterned and gilded, and dappled golden light spilled through the leaves of great trees and down into the many levels. Flowers and draping shrubs fell over the edges of flat roofs to meet the grassy streets on every level, with the houses becoming more and more opulent the higher the level. Ivy crept up the walls of the cave and there was a pair of waterfalls at the far end, shadows giving the illusion that they originated from the rock itself. They flowed into a stream that wound around the edge of the city and out of the cave. Melian’s power settled over the city like a pall, setting everything glowing just faintly in the periphery of her vision.

Artanis wasn’t sure where to look first, and Elrond chuckled at her awestruck expression. She glanced at him, too stunned to be properly annoyed, and he smiled.

“Lothlórien will be even lovelier,” he said, and Artanis felt a twinge of pride that she’d managed to build a realm that could rival a Maia’s.

They were led up winding stairs and through twisting halls to a great throne room. Melian watched them, the slight, curious tilt of her head belying the depth in her eyes. Daeron knelt to his parents, then spoke.

“The rumors of a new city in the mountains have proven true. Many of the Noldor and some Vanyar have sailed from Aman in pursuit of Morgoth and they have built a city in Nevrast called Orontavar. I have negotiated a treaty with them, and if the terms are to your satisfaction, it is ready for your signature. With me are Princess Artanis Arafinwiel and Prince Elrond Makalaurion as representatives of their people.”

Artanis saw Thingol’s eyes widen slightly at the mention of the Noldor. “Finwë’s people?” he asked when Daeron finished, turning to Artanis for an answer.

She opened her mouth to speak, then shook her head. “My grandfather is dead nearly three months at Morgoth’s hand. My uncle, Fëanáro, is our king.”

Thingol looked like he had more questions. “Come with me,” he said after a moment. “We can discuss your treaty this evening, but you must first tell me what I’ve missed.”

“Of course.”

They walked in silence for a minute or two, but Artanis hesitated when Thingol walked out onto a narrow causeway over open air. “We’re quite high up,” she observed, hoping Thingol would hear the nerves in her voice and choose a different path.

No such luck. He merely smiled and offered her his arm. “You will not fall,” he assured, and she wondered if he had a definitive reason for believing that. She carefully did not clench her fingers in his sleeve and let herself be led across the causeway, doing her best not to look down. She’d seen Lothlórien in her visions and many of its buildings were nearly as high or higher, so she would doubtless get used to it, but for now she much preferred solid ground.

They entered a small sitting room, furnished all in white fabrics and dark wood with swirling pale green patterns on the walls. Thingol gestured for her to sit, then sent a servant for refreshments.

“Finwë had more children?” he asked at last.

Artanis nodded. “Fëanáro is the oldest, then Findis, Nolofinwë, and Írimë, and my father, Arafinwë, is the youngest.”

Thingol accepted this, pouring tea for them both then settling back in his chair. “Míriel survived the journey, then? We all worried for her.”

“Ah… no, no, Míriel died when Fëanáro was still just a baby. My grandfather remarried to Indis, King Ingwë’s niece.”

Thingol’s eyes widened a bit. “He…?” Artanis could see him thinking, but he apparently decided not to ask whatever question he’d been going to. Instead, he said, “And now your people are in Beleriand.”

It wasn’t phrased as a question, but Artanis knew she was expected to answer anyway.

“Morgoth has taken something from our family at the expense of a life. We are here with the Valar’s blessing.” That wasn’t entirely true, but Námo had not Doomed them this time around, which was close enough.

Thingol opened his mouth to ask more, but there was a knock on a door she hadn’t noticed before. “Enter,” he called, and the door swung open soundlessly to admit a silver-haired nér in fine blue robes.

His presence hit Artanis like a physical blow and she felt the breath leaving her body as she forced herself to focus on anything but a decade of visions. She knew him. In another life, she’d loved him. He crossed to Thingol, a fleeting glance the only acknowledgement of her presence. They spoke quietly for a moment, then Thingol nodded once and left the room.

The nér looked at her then, brow furrowed in confusion. “Have we met? You seem rather familiar.”

Artanis bit her lip. She wanted to fall into his arms, but of course she couldn’t. He didn’t remember her. She stood and curtsied, suddenly very aware of the dirt on the hems of her travel dress. “Artanis Arafinwiel, princess of the Noldor.”

He sketched a quick bow in return. “Lord Celeborn of Doriath.” Then he sat down on the chair Thingol had just vacated. “Word has traveled quickly of your arrival, you know.”

* * *

Elrond could feel Melian’s presence seeping into the edges of his own, stronger than anything he’d felt before. He was aware, on some level, of Artanis and Thingol leaving and Daeron being dismissed, but he was more focused on blocking out the Maia queen pressing for entrance to his mind.

After a time he didn’t bother to count, she crossed the floor, bare feet silent on the stone, and grabbed him by the arm, pulling him up to his feet. Melian walked away out a side door, and he had no choice but to follow.

She led him to a garden shrouded in shadow, purple flowers draping down from the limbs of trees and dark grass coming up nearly to his knees. In the center was a basin carved from pale stone. She knelt to a little stream and cupped her hands in the water, guiding some of it into the basin. It didn’t drip out of her hands, a show of her power that unnerved him despite its relative minority. 

“Come,” she said, her voice somewhat lower than he’d expected based on her appearance. 

He walked to her, and she reached out to seize his wrists, placing his palms on the edge of the basin, the tips of his fingers just brushing cool water. He realized too late that the water was under Melian’s will. It began to creep up the backs of his fingers and under Melian’s where her hands still rested on his wrists, and her mind crept with them, pressing ever further against his shields. 

Elrond broke under the onslaught of power, far greater than his own or any he’d experienced, and he saw images of Middle-earth and Beleriand from the first time around played out on the unnaturally still water that had fallen back into the basin. Melian searched through his memories, and he got the sense that she was more curious than anything. He knew when she learned of her family’s fate, for her anguish flooded through him as well, the strength of feeling sending him to his knees. Melian didn’t let go of him, keeping his hands on the basin as she continued to search through his mind. He sank into himself and allowed it, finding that it was easier if he didn’t fight. 

When Melian decided she’d seen enough, she let go of Elrond’s wrists and he slumped to the grass, waiting for the world to stop spinning. Melian touched his brow for the briefest of instants, and he felt the headache begin to recede. He accepted her outstretched hand, leaning just slightly on the basin as he got his feet under him. 

“I- apologize,” she said, her words slightly halting as though she’d rarely had to speak aloud. “Mortals are- fragile. You are fragile.”  

Elrond nodded his agreement. “I am, a bit.” 

“You...” she hesitated, searching for words. “You are of mine.” 

“You’re my great great grandmother,” he confirmed.

Melian gave no acknowledgement to his words, but nonetheless he got the sense that she understood and accepted them.

* * *

_A white city nestled in a green valley, ringed by snowy peaks. It wasn’t Tirion, but it was close. Music and laughter rang from what looked like a festival in the square._

_The same city, burning._

_A woman who looked like Elenwë, tall with brown skin and golden hair, her pink dress torn and slightly damp with blood. She had a sword in one hand and the other held onto a man’s. He was not quite so tall as the woman, and not an elf, but he swung his sword with the ease of long practice as the pair led a trailing column of people out of the valley._

_Many left, but still more were visible in the distance, those who’d stayed to fight for their city. One figure toppled over the edge of a crumbling tower, pale stone bathed orange with flame, and plummeted to the earth._

_And then, for just an instant, a map, the valley and a winding trail through the mountains lit up in gold._

* * *

Turukáno jerked awake and got out of bed, careful not to wake Elenwë as he did. He pulled on a light robe and stepped out onto the balcony, the chill night air bringing him further into wakefulness. He’d had the same dream many nights in a row, and while he wasn’t normally prone to bouts of prophesy, he couldn’t help wondering if perhaps it was more than just a dream.

He stood at the balcony railing for a while, watching the stars wheel overhead and not watching the way the trees just beyond the city walls swayed unnaturally as many-legged foes moved through the wood. He didn’t want his daughter to grow up here, where she had to always watch her back in case something slipped past the guards. He wanted her to be safe.

Orontavar wasn’t safe.

Turukáno heard one of the guards take up a cry somewhere to the south and knew that something was attacking. A band of orcs, perhaps, or a spider. He was fairly sure it was still dark enough for spiders to be out, but the first rays of sun were beginning to peak over the horizon to the east, so perhaps not. The sounds of fighting quietened and he wondered if anyone had died.

He hated having to stand in the square and watch funeral pyres lit first thing in the morning. The smoke was heavy and black, leaving the city under a pall for hours after the bodies were little more than ash, and the smell was worse, seeping into the palace through any cracked window and settling in curtains and furniture so that it was inescapable.

A few minutes more passed and he heard Elenwë padding around their room, bare footed as she ever was. The balcony doors creaked a bit when she opened them, coming to stand close beside him. He draped an arm over her shoulders, both of them content to watch the sunrise in silence.

“Are you alright?” his wife asked after a while. “You’ve been up early the last few days.”

Turukáno sighed and tightened his arm around her. “The city isn’t safe,” he said.

Elenwë stilled. “It’s not,” she agreed, her tone flat.

“We should build somewhere that is.”

* * *

Irissë was bored.

Orontavar wasn’t like Tirion, where there was always something interesting happening if one knew where to look. She’d become bored of training; Atar wouldn’t let her sign up for any guard shifts, and she and Tyelko could only sneak out to hunt spiders so many times before the thrill wore itself away. None of her brothers wanted to spend any time with her: Findekáno was understandably wrapped up in his responsibilities and Arakáno’s interests didn’t align at all with Irissë’s.

Neither of those things would be an issue if Turukáno, usually her favorite brother, hadn’t been so secretive lately. He and Elenwë had been stirring up their followers, squirreling supplies away, scouting out through the mountains to the east—all without telling anyone why. She’d asked Itarillë about it once, but the girl had just shrugged. Whatever her parents were doing, she wasn’t involved.

Irissë wandered through the halls of the palace, more austere than Tirion had ever been but also more lively, searching for something to occupy her time. She was fairly sure that there was some sort of construction going on in the north wing; she could go watch the workers, and maybe someone would even let her help. Mind made up, she started up a spiral stair.

The issue with those stairs, Irissë thought a few seconds later, her leg stinging nastily and dust settling in her shoe, was that very few of the people who’d come to Beleriand were architects. And even fewer were stone masons, meaning that it was just a matter of time before something fell apart.

At least Nelyo had been coming down at the same time as she’d been going up. He cousin had seen her foot go through the step and dropped his armful of scrolls to grab her.

“Are you alright?” he asked now, his face a picture of concern.

“Um…” Irissë held onto Nelyo’s arm for balance as she took off her shoe and rolled her leggings up to the knee. Her calf was scraped up and welted, and it would probably bruise, but she wasn’t bleeding. She nodded.

“I’m fine. You?”

Nelyo smiled and let go of her. “I’m not the one who fell through the stairs.”

“I didn’t fall. It broke,” she said shortly, not really offended. She glanced at the hole, wondering what the builder had been thinking. The stone slat, apparently not supported by anything, had snapped down the middle when she’d stepped on it. One of Nelyo’s scrolls was rolling slowly toward the hole, and Irissë pointed at it.

“Do you need that?”

Nelyo made a startled noise, then moved away from her and started to gather up the scrolls he’d dropped, careful of where he stepped. Irissë went down the stairs, avoiding the broken step, and picked up the ones that had fallen to the bottom landing.

One had come open, the contents bared to anyone who might walk by, and Irissë couldn’t help pausing to look at it before she rolled it back up. It was full of sums and diagrams. It didn’t quite look like a blueprint, but it looked like it could become one fairly easily. Nelyo came down and she handed him the rolled up scrolls, then turned the one she was holding so he could look at it.

“What are you doing?” she asked, curious.

“I’m going to build a settlement,” he said, taking the scroll from her and rolling it back up before adding it to the pile.

Irissë stood up quickly, tilting her head back a little to look her cousin in the eye. “Can I help?”

Nelyo looked uncertain. Irissë bounced a little on the balls of her feet, biting her lip. Oh! She could do things!

“I can fight and hunt and guard and manage things and I can even do politics if you really want me to. Let me come with you,” she pleaded.

Nelyo still looked uncertain but he nodded. “Alright. But you have to listen to me.”

“Of course!”

* * *

Fëanáro spent most of his days in the forge, forgoing politics unless it became necessary. Nerdanel was easily the more diplomatic of the two, so he spent his time repairing weapons and searching for something to keep the spiders and orcs away. If he could just figure out where the spiders came from, why their webs ate up all the light…

He stilled abruptly. A lack of light. Darkness.

The spiders only came near the city walls on moonless nights, and on the sunniest of days they hid deep enough in the forest that the children could safely play outside the walls. If the spiders came from darkness, as was seeming more and more likely the longer he thought about it, then all he needed to do to keep them away was make a light.

“Atar?”

Fëanáro dragged himself out of his thoughts. Curufinwë stood on the other side of his anvil, looking only mildly concerned. His son pointed at the anvil, where the steel he’d just heated had faded back to grey.

“Oh,” Fëanáro said, then put the chunk of steel on a table to the side and began looking for a clean sheet of paper.

Curufinwë came around the anvil, curious, and looked over his father’s shoulder. “What did you come up with?”

Fëanáro scratched out a little diagram in the corner of a paper, then started a proper plan on that same page. “The spiders,” he said.

“Really.” He could tell from Curufinwë’s tone that his son had not followed his thought process.

“They don’t like the light.”

“So if we build a large enough light, then the spiders will stay away,” Curufinwë said, slowly at first and then more quickly.

Fëanáro heard the understanding snap into place and grinned. “Exactly! If we build a lighting system around the city-”

“We can use mirrors on the towers to catch the sunlight.”

“And a power source of our own during the night.”

“Will it work on the orcs too?”

Fëanáro paused for a moment, thinking about that. “I think it should, as long as we have the right type of light.”

“And what is the right type of light?”

* * *

Curufinwë stood aside, watching with idle amusement as his father’s expression turned thoughtful and he was still for a moment before jolting into action, digging through old notes and prototypes. Atar would explain as soon as he realized Curufinwë wasn’t following, though that could be a while yet.

“I already made three Silmarils,” Atar said eventually, and Curufinwë felt his eyes widen as he took the few steps across the forge to take the stack of notes his father held.

“No,” he said, in the same tone he used when Tyelpë was being unreasonable. “Look where the Silmarils got us, and tell me if you really want that again.”

* * *

Fëanáro reeled back as though he’d been struck. Of course he didn’t want all the troubles of the Silmarils to happen again. But on the darkest nights, the spiders braved the walls to pick off guards, and parts of his family were on the guard roster. He couldn’t let them get hurt if there was anything he could do to protect them.

“Curufinwë,” he said at last. His son didn’t move, expression stony. Eru, he didn’t want to do what he was about to, but if it meant his family was safe… “Tyelpë wants to be on the guard rotation.”

Curufinwë went white, the pages in his hands fluttering to the floor. He’d seen people come back after they were bitten, black ooze spreading through their veins as they screamed out their last breaths, and Fëanáro knew that he was imagining his son in the same situation.

He was imagining it, and it wasn’t a pleasant image.

“Alright,” Curufinwë said shakily after a few minutes, the color beginning to return to his face. “What do you want me to do?”

Fëanáro knelt to pick up the notes and Curufinwë followed him to the table. He’d already captured the light of the Trees. He could capture sunlight as well.

* * *

The forge was far too warm. Curufinwë’s hair was beginning to come loose from its ponytail and sweat beaded along his arms and brow as he worked in near silence, only interrupted by his father’s instructions.

“Steady,” Fëanáro murmured, hovering just outside the sphere of light created by the project they worked on, clearly thrown off by being in the forge but unable to participate in the forgework.

Curufinwë made a soft noise of understanding, pushing his discomfort to the back of his mind and pouring the molten stone into the mold. Noon sunlight slanted through a small hole they’d drilled in the roof, bathing the mold in its golden glow as Curufinwë took up a short, repetitive verse. He was a better musician than his father, though nowhere near comparable to Makalaurë, and their planning had made use of that fact extensively.

Curufinwë’s throat felt raw from singing the same few verses over again for hours, though he knew he would continue for hours more, even if only for Tyelpë’s sake. He set aside his tools and fixed his hair into a low, tight braid, then settled on a stool, exhausted but not breaking the rhythm of the Song. His father came to stand behind him with his hands on his shoulders, a reassuring presence.

Hours later, when the height of moonlight had passed and Curufinwë was very nearly asleep where he sat, he cracked open the mold. They’d melted down a few handfuls of pebbles earlier, taken from construction sites around the city. Now Curufinwë held a single large stone, glowing brilliantly iridescent with the light of sun and moon. Pride welled in his chest at his father’s soft gasp.

“You must name your creation, ionya,” Fëanáro said, his tone as close to reverent as it had ever been.

A name… “Caumaon.” It came to Curufinwë’s lips unbidden, but it fit. A stone made to protect for so long as the city still stood

And it would, mounted on the highest tower of the palace, with mirrors placed around the city so that no corner was ever in shadow.

* * *

Melkor growled, sending his lieutenants away with a gesture. Each time he tried to tell them of what he’d found in the Noldor princess’s mind, the words stubbornly would not come. He suspected that Eru had something to do with it, but that was fine. He didn’t have to tell anyone why he made his plans, only command his lackeys to enact them.

The musical brat, the son of Fëanáro, was the greatest threat to his power. He’d lived through Melkor’s power once before and survived, which meant that he was either stupidly lucky or genuinely skilled. Melkor wasn’t going to count on the former.

He sent out scouts often, but so far, the Noldor hadn’t left their mountain city other than to establish trade with Doriath. That could be an issue later, since the Sinda king had taken a Maia to wife, but Melian alone was hardly a match for Melkor and all of his Úmaiar.

And he’d been making greater beasts since he’d first acquired the knowledge, ones that could withstand sunlight long enough for a daylight battle, ones that were so large that a whole team of elves would be hard pressed to slay them, massive flying ones who could snatch the largest of birds direct from the air, ones that looked like injured people or animals until their victims came too close. His greatest triumphs, though, came of a few of Ungoliant’s spawn that he’d _borrowed_.

Creatures of gossamer shadow with far too many legs, too fragile to be particularly dangerous but large enough to cast a battlefield into darkness and send opposing armies despairing. And tiny, tiny creatures barely the size of a thumb with venom enough to drop a score of elves.

Melkor was prepared, but he was not afraid. When the elves decided to make their strike, he would be ready.

Mairon entered the long throne hall then, his fair guise slipping away like water. Soft features became sharp once more and blue eyes turned fiery gold. Pale curls of hair turned back to their natural red as Melkor’s first lieutenant crossed the room, his boots making clipped sounds on the dark stone. He was smirking like a cat with the cream and a crowd of a dozen or so figures trailed nervously behind him. Melkor felt himself grin.

They were of the race of Men.

* * *

Mairon slipped through the darkness of the night-shrouded wood, bending the shadows to hide him even though the form he had taken was garbed all in shining white.

He was scouting for something, though he knew not what. His lord had grown secretive of late, telling no one his reasonings and even, once in a while, seeming uncertain. Mairon was not certain that he should continue to follow a lord whose trust in him was beginning to wane.

He slowed when the trees began to thin, creeping nearer to flickering firelight and quiet but jovial voices speaking in a language he’d never heard before. He watched them, singing up-tempo songs and dancing around a smiling pair. Perhaps a wedding, then?

The curiosity inherent in all of Aulë’s Maiar got the better of him, and he stepped out of the shadows, still hugging the edge of the forest, watching as the music picked up and their feet flew. They looked similar to the Eldar, but their frames were not so willowy and the only glow around them came from their large fire. And they had round ears, he noticed as one’s braids slid off their shoulder. He quickly shifted his own ears to match, though he was sure the effect would be unsettling should he look in a mirror. Mairon didn’t notice how close he’d come to their festivities until the ones nearest him halted abruptly. The crowd parted and one stepped forward.

Mairon had seen beards but rarely, on Aulë and Mahtan—and even now it felt odd, even in the relative privacy of his own mind, to refer to the great smith as anything other than Master Mahtan—but this creature had what was most definitely a beard, though it was wiry and streaked with grey, and Mairon felt reasonably certain in assuming that the figure stood stoically before him was male.

The man spoke in a gravelly voice, and Mairon listened to the way the Music flowed around the man’s speech, something that had grown considerably more difficult since he’d fallen in with Melkor’s lot. It took him a moment to decipher the gist of the man’s statement, a suspicious-toned question of identity.

Unperturbed, he shifted the Music to make his dulcet tones understood, announcing himself as Annatar—Fëanáro would appreciate the irony, if word ever got back to him—and sweeping a gracious bow.

The man suggested that he join them in their revelry, and Mairon wondered at their lack of caution even as he forced himself to decline the invitation with a shake of his head.

“I am a disciple of the great Vala Melkor. I wish to bring your people his glory,” he said, and the words tasted of lies on his tongue.

He no longer _wanted_ to follow Melkor, he realized. If the Vala would not trust even his most loyal servant with his secrets, Mairon wasn’t sure that he could trust the Vala. But he couldn’t leave without making preparations; Melkor would destroy him.

Some of the people looked curious, muttering amongst themselves for a few minutes, and then their leader spoke. “What must we do for the glory of Melkor?”

Mairon smiled, careful to keep the expression softer than he might in Angband but still intimidating. “Follow me, to my lord’s domain. He will receive you into his service with open arms.”

Some of the people looked eager, others hesitant, but most merely seemed neutral. Their leader spoke again, uncertain.

“For so long as any of us can remember, we have lived in this wood. There are those of us who will not want to leave.”

Another approached, nodding. The sculpt of the clothes she wore and the child swaddled to her chest made it clear that she was female. “I would not move my family from our home, but your Melkor sounds glorious.”

Mairon was struck with an idea. He had an opportunity here, one he hadn’t been ordered _not_ to take.

He softened his smile further, beckoning the woman come close. She did, and Mairon swirled his hands, faint orange light gathering at his fingertips. The dramatics weren’t really necessary, but the gasp that rippled through the crowd was satisfying anyway. Mairon placed his hands of the woman’s temples, letting the light halo around her head to distract her as he planted the seeds of his own power, not Melkor’s, in her mind.

Several more stepped forward when the woman confirmed that she felt normal, asking him to do the same to them, and Mairon gladly obliged.

One man shoved him when he set a wide-eyed teenage girl’s hair aglow in gold. “Don’t touch my daughter,” the man snapped.

Ah. It hadn’t occurred to Mairon that some of them might not _want_ to go along with what he was saying. That could be an issue. The man attempted to shove him again, a couple of others joining in now that someone had started it, and Mairon caught them in a pulse of Maia power strong enough to make them stumble but not hurt them in any obvious way. He would be long gone by the time the spell truly set in, and hopefully no one would make the connection.

He led those who wanted to go away then, leaving the rest. He hadn’t dealt with all of them, but those he’d left alone had not tried to go against him.

* * *

Bëor didn’t like Annatar. Oh, he looked kind enough, but his eyes were just a little too perceptive, his smiles a little too sharp, to be completely safe. He watched with a score of others as the man left with a fraction of his people and cast spells over half, and felt his suspicions reinforced.

The men and one woman who had attacked Annatar had not been wise, he realized days later as those four grew ill beyond any of their healers’ ability to help. He presided over the ceremony of their death, then gathered those who felt the same as he and started off in the direction opposite where Annatar had gone.

* * *

Findaráto was bored. He knew he sounded ungrateful: he was to marry Amarië in a few days’ time, no matter to the fact that they were already wed in the eyes of Ilúvatar, and, despite the odds being stacked against them, all of his family was safe thanks to Curufinwë’s invention. He shouldn’t be bored, and when he’d admitted it to Amarië in the privacy of their bed under dark of night, he’d felt a bit guilty at the look that crossed her face in the instant before she’d smiled and joked that she’d have to do something about that.

“We could elope, you know,” he said one night, her bright curls twined round his fingers and his other hand running idly over the dark skin of her hip.

Her eyes opened and she lifted her head from his chest, confusion contorting her lovely features. “Why would we elope when we will be wed properly in just a few days?”

Findaráto felt the guilt begin to build in the pit of his stomach once more. Still, he pressed on, too stubborn to admit defeat. “I know Caumaon’s light bothers you—”

“It is unnatural.”

“—and you know that I don’t like being unable to leave the city. Were we to leave, we wouldn’t have to endure either.”

Amarië shook her head, reaching up to brush her hair behind her ear when it fell into her face. “Where would we go?”

He pretended to think about it for a moment, though he already had an idea of what he wanted to do. “I would build you a big house in a meadow, with colorful flowers like in Valimar. It would be next to a river, because you like to swim, and we would plant a garden with vegetables and fruit trees. There would be a room for you to paint, and a patio where we could dance. And there would be extra bedrooms, in case we ever want to have children, but we don’t have to do that for a long time yet if you don’t want to.”

Amarië was peering at him through thick lashes, her blue eyes a little wider than usual. “Do _you_ want to have children?” she asked, her tone serious.

Findaráto really did have to think about that. “I would love to have a son or a daughter with you. But… I don’t think I want my children to grow up in a city where they can’t play without guards nearby.”

Amarië nodded. “I hadn’t thought about it before, but I don’t think I want that either.”

And then she swung her bare legs over the side of the bed, pulling a robe on and walking to the wardrobe in search of proper clothes. Findaráto sat up, surprised.

“What are you doing?”

She turned back to him, holding an armful of green and brown fabric. The smile on her lips didn’t quite smooth out the furrow between her brows. “You said you want to build us a house in a meadow by the river.”

He nodded, not quite following what that had to do with getting dressed in the middle of the night.

“Well, then, we need to find a nice meadow.” She dropped the robe and began to dress, and Findaráto realized that she was putting on one of his shirts over her riding leggings.

“Oh!” He tossed the bedcovers aside and went to join her at the wardrobe, ignoring, for the time being, how his shirt was just a little too tight for her in a way that stole his breath.

“We need provisions for a few weeks at least,” he said, words muffled through the fabric of his tunic as he pulled it over his head.

Amarië hummed her agreement. “Supplies to last long enough to get ourselves established.”

* * *

They slipped out of the city through the mountains to the north, leaving a note on their bed for their family to find once it was realized they were gone. They found a river and followed its winding path, hunting when they grew tired of waybread and dried fruit. For a while, it felt like a honeymoon.

Then they came upon a camp in a meadow that perfectly fit their imagined haven. There were nine tents of coarse brown fabric, arranged close together with a large fire pit in the center. There were perhaps twenty people milling about the camp, and even from afar the situation had a tense air.

When Findaráto and Amarië approached, they were stopped by a pair of adolescent boys carrying jagged-edged swords. Findaráto had no doubt that they knew how to use them, but they looked too nervous to put up a proper fight if it came to it. One of the boys ran into the center of the camp, and they could see him duck into one of the smaller tents. He returned with a man Findaráto assumed to be their leader, and he was thrown off for a moment by the man’s dark beard.

The man spoke in a language Findaráto had never heard. He shook his head, holding his hands out with palms up as he shrugged to demonstrate his confusion. The man frowned deeply, though he somehow looked reassured by the language barrier.

He pointed to himself and said, very firmly, “Bëor.”

“Bëor,” Findaráto and Amarië repeated. He nodded, then pointed to them, a questioning look on his face.

“Findaráto,” Findaráto said and waited for Bëor’s nod, then pointed to his wife. “Amarië.”

Bëor repeated their names back at them for confirmation. He said something to the boys, who lowered their blades and stepped aside for the two elves to enter the camp. They were led to Bëor’s tent, and the man sat on a folding chair, offering them the cot with a wave of his hand. He sighed, and Findaráto waited for him to speak, in vain though it may be.

“Melkor,” the man said at last, and Findaráto nearly reeled in surprise. That was certainly a name he knew, though the dark Vala was more often referred to lately as Moringotto. Findaráto frowned, tangling his fingers with Amarië’s and letting his concern show on his face.

Bëor looked like some suspicion of his had been confirmed. He spoke in his own language then, accompanied by explanatory gestures that didn’t really help, though Findaráto recognised the words “Melkor” and “Annatar” as familiar. Eventually, he gathered that Annatar must be one of Moringotto’s Úmaiar.

Amarië looked at him, trepidation in her eyes. “It can’t be safe to be wandering about with no destination in mind when Moringotto’s servants are abroad.”

Findaráto shook his head. “No. We need to find somewhere defensible for a settlement.”

Amarië nodded slowly, still a bit hesitant.

* * *

Findaráto was alarmed to find that the canyon they eventually decided on was occupied by a group of bearded creatures who looked like very short versions of Aulë and excelled just as much in forgework. Amarië was quick to befriend their leader, though, a dark haired lady with uncanny green eyes, her gowns decked in silver and gold and gems.

They and Bëor’s people were invited into the city, and as soon as he was able, Findaráto sent off a letter to Orontavar warning them of Annatar, hoping that nothing bad had happened in the interim.

* * *

Fëanáro was… fuming wasn’t the right word, but it was the closest he could think of at the moment. Nolofinwë watched his half-brother pace around the council room after tossing the letter to the floor, wondering what could have been written on the little piece of stiff brown parchment to cause him such distress.

The letter had come sealed with unbroken white wax and fine satin ribbon, delivered by a Doriath patrolman who wouldn’t say where she’d gotten it, only that she was to wait for a reply. Fëanáro had opened the letter, read it, and stood to begin his pacing, making everyone wince with the way his heavy chair scraped across the stone floor.

The council was still settled around the table, all as baffled as Nolofinwë. Elenéþa, her eyes tracking Fëanáro’s movement, reached for the letter with one slippered toe, pulling it closer when Fëanáro was turned away, then leaned down to pick it up. She scanned the page, her eyes widening just a bit. Quietly, she handed it across the table to Nolofinwë. It was in Findaráto’s handwriting, which brought a measure of relief after the three weeks his nephew and his wife had been missing, though the tone was almost painfully formal.

* * *

_To my esteemed uncles and cousins and to the Noldor of Orontavar,_

_In the time I’ve been away from the city, my wife and I have come upon certain knowledge which may be relevant to the continued survival of the peoples of Beleriand._

_On the banks of a river four days leisurely ride north east of Orontavar was discovered a camp of people who have named themselves “humans”. In the time since, I and my wife have spoken with their leader and found that they once lived over the mountains to the east, until they were approached by one who called himself Annatar._

_Annatar offered them false hope under Moringotto, and some accepted the offer and traveled away with him, presumably to Angamando. Others, a dozen and a half by the estimate of their leader, allowed Annatar to place them under a spell, the effects of which are unknown. Still others attacked Annatar, and her pushed back through force of magic. Those same attackers later died of an incurable sickness._

_Myself and my wife joined their camp in hopes of helping them to establish a defensible city. Eventually, we came to a canyon some days south of Doriath, the exact location of which I will not tell. There we met the Khazad, who claim to be Aulë’s children. We were invited into their kingdom of Nargothrond, and it is there that we now dwell, in safety and comfort._

_Should you require aid from the people of Nargothrond against Moringotto’s attacks, many patrolmen of Doriath will be capable of delivering a letter._

_Findaráto Artafindë, Prince of the Noldor and Lord of Nargothrond_

* * *

Ah. Nolofinwë could see now why that may have been upsetting, though Fëanáro was, as usual, overreacting a bit. The letter was not from a subject to his king or a nephew to his uncle, but from one leader to another. Findaráto was establishing a power outside of the traditional hierarchy, and he was announcing it by deigning to give the neighboring kingdoms important information that they wouldn’t have known otherwise.

Whether or not it was intentionally so political, Nolofinwë wasn’t sure, but Fëanáro would undoubtedly see it that way. Though, with Nerdanel’s calming influence…

This could be interesting.

* * *

When Irissë had asked to join Nelyafinwë in his endeavor to build a fortress from which to keep an eye on Moringotto, she had not expected to have to trek up snowy mountains with a pack full of heavy equipment, the horses having been left in a makeshift stable somewhere below the treeline, where the air wasn’t so cold that her breath fogged. Her legs burned with every step, and she was half afraid that they might give out before they reached the top. Her best consolation was that Nelyo also looked taken aback by the difficulty of the steep slope.

They did reach the top before Irissë’s legs gave out beneath her, though it was a close thing, and the company swept a circle of snow away from the stone and began to build a fire with wood and kindling which Nelyo had insisted on packing up the mountain despite Irissë and everyone else looking at him like he was insane.

Now, settling down in a fur beside the fire with him, taking full advantage of the fact that her cousin tended to run warm, Irissë was sorry she’d complained. The cold had bit through layers of cloth and leather and fur to chill her skin uncomfortably, and the fire was beginning to dispel some of that chill. The stew one of their company distributed did wonders as well.

When it began to grow dark, their people settled in for the night four to a tent to keep the chill at bay. Irissë was with Nelyo and two others who had helped organize this venture. Dark shapes moved about outside, and Irissë’s hunters’ instincts, honed in the deepest shadows of Oromë’s forests with Tyelko, fired. She sat up, grabbing for her bow. The other woman in the tent, a Vanyarin ex-priestess, grumbled, but Nelyo sat up with her.

“What is it?” he whispered, perhaps sensing that quiet was the better part of wisdom at the moment.

Irissë crept to the tent flap and pushed it aside just enough to see outside. She drew back quickly when she saw the shadowy form of what was most certainly not an elf slip into the next tent over, a jagged, curved blade glinting darkly in the moonlight reflected off of snow. Nelyo looked at her in question, and she placed her bow down in exchange for her long sword. Nelyo grabbed his own blade and shook their two companions awake. All three crouched ready at Irissë’s back, not knowing what they would be fighting but knowing that, if it frightened Irissë, it was most certainly dangerous.

Irissë listened to the thing’s footsteps crunch softly on the snow, her heart hammering in her throat and stark terror making the icy air even harder to breathe with every step closer to their tent the thing took. The tent flap swept aside soundlessly and surprise twisted the thing’s grotesque features in the instant before Irissë drove her blade cleanly through its chest with a cry that was sure to wake the whole camp.

Its blood spilled over her chest and shoulders almost painfully hot in the cold night as she kept her momentum, pushing the thing away from their tent and realizing that it was significantly taller than she’d estimated. Nelyo was right behind her, thankfully, and he was tall enough to deliver a final blow.

The terror clenched around her lungs like a vice released all at once, and she gasped in air like a drowned woman. Straightening, shivering a bit as the blood cooled sticky in her clothes, Irissë took in the camp. About half of their people were up and fighting at least six more of the creatures, and Irissë felt a sinking feeling in her gut. Were all those not fighting dead?

Terrified once more, but this time not by any unnatural means, she ducked into the tent next to hers. Of the four people inside, one was very obviously dead, given the amount of blood spilled over her blankets. Another was utterly still, almost seeming asleep. The other two were curled together in a corner, looking paralyzed with fear. Irissë knelt to the sleeping one, searching for a pulse on an unnaturally cold wrist and nearly pulling away when she found it, jackrabbiting much too fast to be healthy or safe. She met the eyes of the two in the corner.

“Can you two mind her?” she asked, nodding to the sleeping woman who most likely wasn’t really sleeping.

One of the two nodded, a girl who looked just barely out of adolescence.

“Good. Stay in here until I tell you it’s safe to come out.”

She nodded again, eyes fixed on Irissë’s bloody nightclothes. “Yes, princess.”

Irissë left the tent and flew back into the fray, doing her best to block out the mind numbing terror that struck her each time she came too close to one of the creatures and hating the vulnerability that came with fighting a foe so much larger than herself.

When dawn broke over their camp, the last of the creatures fled, and Irissë made her way to Nelyo’s side where he stood on a large rock overlooking the section of collapsed tents near one edge. She grimaced at the way her shirt was sticky-stiff and creaking as she walked, wrinkles frozen into place against her skin when blood dried and hardened in icy wind.

“How do we fare?” she asked, having seen him stop to speak to various people on the way to his lookout point.

“A third dead,” he said grimly.

Irissë knew her shock must have shown on her face. She hadn’t thought it could be so bad…

“And another quarter of those who survived are unconscious and unresponsive,” Nelyo finished.

At the mention of the unconscious, Irissë’s memory flew back to the girls she’d spoken to at the beginning of the night and she sprung down off the stone, weaving her way through people and tents and bodies to find them. She entered their tent, and one of the women pointed a little knife at her before realizing who it was and sheathing the weapon. The girl tending their unconscious friend looked up, worrying at her lip.

“She hasn’t woken at all,” she said.

“She isn’t the only one,” Irissë told her. “But it’s safe to leave the tent now, and we’re working on building defenses. I’ll try to figure out what we’re doing with those who are,” she hesitated and trailed off, gesturing at the unresponsive woman. The girl nodded her understanding.

* * *

Mairon was making his way south. He had been spending less and less time in Angband under Melkor’s thumb in the hopes that his master would neglect to track his activities if he moved gradually enough. He’d begun the long trek around Doriath two nights before, taking the wide crescent at a fairly leisurely pace since he didn’t have anything particularly urgent in mind and had no desire to meet with Queen Melian’s idea of justice for his actions, whatever that may be.

He was skirting around the edge of a patch of forest, the trees tall and dark and twisted in an admittedly unappealing mockery of their neighbors beyond Doriath’s border. The sudden sense of Melian’s presence had him reeling back from where he knew the queen’s realm to be, making his way into the grey twilight of the forest at his back despite the fact that it was almost the last place he wanted to be at that moment.

As Mairon moved deeper into the wood, he felt Melian’s presence grow almost stiflingly strong, and wondered if perhaps he was perceiving it wrongly. If her presence was so strong, she should be merely feet away from him, but she was nowhere to be seen.

There was, however, a tall figure standing in the shadowed trees at the edge of visibility. He glowed not with the light of the Maiar, but very faintly with the light of the Eldar, and Mairon felt unexpectedly embarrassed at being caught in the panic of thinking Melian to be near. The figure spoke sharply in primitive Sindarin, demanding to know what Mairon was doing there. Mairon didn’t deign to give an answer, instead shooting the question back at the elf.

He laughed harshly, then approached, brandishing a wicked looking knife.

“I live here,” he said, low and threatening, and Mairon’s mind was already whirling through possible outcomes of the situation. It wasn’t likely that the man would succeed in killing his body, though total death of his physical form would send his spirit back to the realm of the Ainur, which was a risk he wasn’t willing to take. So decided, he grinned, sharp and predatory, and stalked nearer to meet the man halfway.

“Do you?” he purred, in the tone that never failed to make his fellow Úmaiar nervous.

He could see the man falter, but he rallied quickly. Impressive.

“I do. Do you know where you are, traveller?” He didn’t wait for Mairon to answer, not that he would’ve. “You’re in Nan Elmoth. There’s probably more Maia magic here than anywhere else east of the sea.”

Mairon sharpened his grin further, letting the fell flame of Aulë flicker behind the shell of his physical form. “Well then, it is a good thing I am of the _Úmaiar_.”

The man’s expression changed little, but it was clear that he hadn’t had any training in mental shielding. Mairon could read his ambitions, his hopes and fears and desires in the air. He wanted power and influence that had been denied him for some unclear reason. Well. He could work with that.

“If you follow me, you could have power over all of Eä.” He didn’t bother to infuse the words with any of his considerable power, he thought it a mark of his ability that he didn’t need to. The man was enthralled by mere words, hanging off the possibility of becoming all-powerful.

“What must I do?” he asked, his blade dropping to his side.

Mairon smirked. “The Noldor are… bothersome,” he said, leaving the way he came and letting his newest follower take that statement how he would.

* * *

All the monarchs in Beleriand were hanging on by a thread. Fëanáro was struggling to balance the interests of his family and his people. Thingol was attempting to unite a fractious people, with some wanting to make a stand and others wanting to retreat further behind Melian’s enchanted barrier. Círdan and his people had gone south to Balar to escape Morgoth’s increased aggression, from his letters, Findaráto was stumbling his way through a rise to power in an unfamiliar culture, and Turukáno was entirely missing.

It was hardly a good situation, and less so since word had come from Himring of their dwindling resources and Sauron’s disappearance. Maglor couldn’t help thinking that it had something to do with the sudden rise in orc raids and spider attacks. He had a feeling that Morgoth and Sauron were fighting each other as much as they were the elves, but the elves still got caught in the crossfire upsettingly often. They had to fight for what they had, before there was nothing left to be fought over.

He expressed as much to Elenéþa one night, and the next morning she brought it up in the council session. Fëanáro, as much a man of action as of words, was quick to agree. A missive was sent to Thingol, and negotiations dragged on, days turning into weeks before they received a letter signed not by Thingol or Daeron, but by Melian and her daughter.

They would march to war inside of the month.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Caumaon is a very, very rough Quenya translation of Arkenstone, given that "ark" means, roughly, "to protect". I decided since Feanor made the Silmarils and Tyelpe made the Rings, Curufin got to make the other most problematic bit of jewelery in Middle-earth's history.


End file.
